A Year To Remember
by heartintooverdrive
Summary: In their final year at Hogwarts,Voldemort takes a more active turn in the war, and our dear Marauders and Lily and her friends seem to be in the middle of it all. Maybe it isn't such a good thing that Lily and James have finally gotten together, or is it?
1. Old Enemies, New Neighbours

**Disclaimer: **JK Rowling owns all but the majority of this plot (which is mine). I do not gain anything from writing this.

**A Year To Remember**

**Chapter 1**

**~ Old Enemies, New Neighbours ~**

Lily only had one more year left at Hogwarts, and to say that she was sad about it would be underestimated. Sure she would miss going to Hogsmeade, the visits to Hagrid's hut and the castle itself, but this year was different from the previous six. She was, and is, an orphan. Just before her seventeenth birthday, her mother died on Easter Sunday. Two days before receiving her letter from Hogwarts confirming her status as head girl, her father died. Of course, nothing could get better, seeing as the person she despised most was Head Boy. No one in their right mind would _dare _to make James _Bloody _Potter a Head Boy. She honestly wondered what on earth had been going through her headmasters mind at the time. But then again, her Professor Dumbledore never seemed to have a _normal _thought going through his head; he was great, but a bit barmy at times.

Right now, Lily was sitting in a small room with Petunia and her whale-like boyfriend Vernon, listening to the reading of their father's will. It seemed that the entire Evans fortune was split 50-50 between the two girls. Needless to say, Petunia was very angry. She expected being the eldest that she would get more than her sister. The only thing that calmed her down was an on-the-spot proposal from her boyfriend. Lily was rather confused why he chose that particular moment to do it, but, talking with Vernon later, they both agreed that itdid at least shut her up for a while.

After two hours, many more outbursts (Petunia) and tears (Lily), and boredness (Vernon) the two siblings found themselves going their separate ways. Lily first apparated to a muggle supermarket to buy some bread and milk, she paid and then walked out the door. She began looking for a secluded spot to apparate back home. Eventually she found one behind a very large, smelly bin. Holding her nose, she spun on the spot and disapparated to her front door. Walking to her kitchen, she began thinking about lunch. Deciding that sandwiches would be easiest, she set about making some. Carrying a plate to her room, she sat down on her beg, grabbed one and began eating.

Only minutes later, she began getting a feeling she was being watched. So, putting her sandwich down, she turned around and walked towards the window and looked out. To her absolute horror, staring up at her, from the windows on the house next door, were the most annoying people she had ever laid eyes on; Sirius Black, Remus Lupin and the super annoying James Potter. Gasping, she rushed to the side, so they couldn't see her, and then cautiously looked back out, _yep, it's them alright_, she thought to herself, and she promptly shut the window and curtains shut, blocking the view both in and out of the window.

Lily sat down at her desk and pulled out a new piece pf parchment, her quill and ink and began writing to her headmaster. By making Potter the Head Boy, he must surely want her life to become a living hell, and she wasn't going to go through with her life in shatters. Particularly after all he ever did to her, _NO, it just isn't right. We just don't go together; it was like trying to get a dragon to not be fire and to not eat the neighbours. Nuh-uh, not happening_, she thought to herself, before adding it to the letter she began to write.

James, Sirius and Remus looked out the window, gaping at the red-haired girl that was their new neighbour. They'd only just moved back into this particular Potter house and they'd already found a hot muggle girl, so _hopefully_ James could get over the fact that Lily would never go out with him. But then suddenly the redhead came closer to the window and opened it up. There was no mistake about it! Being only ten metres away, the trio cold easily tell that this was no muggle neighbour, this was Lily Evans! The only one they knew that had a temper that matched her hair, and her eyes – well, they were just the most beautiful things had ever seen.

"Blimey mate, you don't reckon –?" asked Sirius, a little _too _nervously for him.

"Yeah I reckon it was her. See? There she is again," James answered, just as nervously as his best mate – after all, it's not everyday that you find out that you have moved next door to someone you really like. (Even if they don't like you back)

"Hey Prongs, maybe you'll have a bit more luck over the next few days," Sirius added with a bit of a grin on his face. Just as Lily slammed her window shut.

Remus scoffed, "Yeah right Padfoot, three days to woo a girl that's turned him down for the past six years." James laughed, but then said gravely.

"I have to agree with Moony there Paddy," Sirius frowned. "But that won't stop me!"

"Are you two hungry?" Remus asked, James and Sirius nodded, "Good, 'cause I want some chocolate, NOW!"

James and Sirius stared at each other and laughed, before catching Remus' evil look. Sharing their own evil looks, they put their Marauding minds into action.

&&&

Lily dipped her quill back in the ink bottle one last time before she called down her sleeping owl, Socks, and tied the letter to his leg before sending him off through that unfortunate window. Slumping back down on the chair, she turned on the radio and began munching on one of the sandwiches in time to the music. After finishing her pile of sandwiches, she decided that she was _very _tired, so she was soon asleep on the bed, with no hope of awakening any time soon.

Only moments afterwards, a boy of seventeen squeezed through her still open window; he took one look at Lily and cast a quick sleeping charm at the poor girl. It at least granted him thirty minutes in the house.


	2. Discovering A Stupid Mistake

**Disclaimer:** I AM NOT JK ROWLING!

**A Year To Remember**

**Chapter 2**

**~ Discovering a Stupid Mistake ~**

Quickly and quietly, the boy, who was none other than Sirius Black - the ONLY one foolish to climb through Lily Evan's open window – opened her bedroom door and headed down the stairs, carefully watching out for anything out of the ordinary. But then again, he being there was out of the ordinary. The only reason he was making this dangerous trip was because Moony needed some chocolate desperately (for some reason know only to the werewolf himself!) So Sirius decided it was upon himself to see if the lovely Miss Evans had any to spare. Of course it had taken the best part of half an hour to figure out how to get over the ten metre gap and through the window AND back again, but he knew it would be worth it once Moony shut up about James and Sirius not even knowing the area well enough to know where to buy chocolate.

Creeping down the hallway, Sirius finally found the kitchen cupboard. He quickly opened it and found, much to his delight, heaps of chocolate. Not thinking clearly, he grabbed the entire lot and rushed back upstairs, being Sirius, he didn't shut the cupboard door, or the kitchen door, or any of the doors he opened on the way down. Noting that he had five minutes until sleeping beauty was to wake up, he stuffed all the chocolates into a basket and quickly got back across the two windows.

Needless, to say the other two were very pleased at his return because Lily was just starting to wake up from the spell, although, but they were _very_ curious as to how much chocolate Sirius brought over in his basket. Surely Sirius wouldn't bring over _all_ of Lily's chocolate, would he?

Lily sat up as soon as the spell wore off, something was not right. She glanced at her door, t_hat wasn't open before_, nor was her window, well, actually maybe it was. She shut the window, and walked out the door, and, thanks to Sirius' stupidness, found herself following the open doors on a path to the kitchen, taking a glance at the chocolate-less-cupboard, she screeched out, "POTTER", and ran to the front door.

The best course of action, she decided, was to storm right up to their front door, talk calmly to his parents and angrily get her payback at Potter and his friends. Of course, anyone knew that this particular redhead in a bad mood was like setting fire to your own home, you're gonna die!!!

Putting a calm face on, she rang the doorbell and Mr Potter opened the door.

"Good evening, Mr Potter, you must be our new neighbours; I'm Lily Evans from number twelve."  
"Hi Lily, nice to meet you, sorry, we're kind of busy to entertain right now, could you possibly come back in an hour or two?" he asked as politely as possible, seeing a muggle, couldn't really come into a wizards home.  
"Actually I was planning on talking to your son and his friends, you know, James, Sirius and Remus, the crazy Marauders," she replied.  
"How do you know what their called? You don't know them do you?"  
"Well actually it's hard not to, you see, your son has been trying to get me to go out with him since first year unfortunately."

"Oh, you mean you're not a –"  
'Muggle?" at his nod she continued, "No, but I'm muggle-born."  
"Of course, but who really cares about your bloodline," he beamed, "Any way, I suppose you'd like to come in."  
"But didn't you just –"  
"I thought you were a muggle dear, can't have muggles in a magical home like ours, they'd freak out."  
'Oh, thank you very much Mr Potter." She replied and walked into the house. "Where are the boys anyway?"  
"Oh, erm, I think they are on the third floor, second door to the, ri-left, yep, second door to the left, and call me Harold, please." Harold Potter said.

"Thanks again Mr-Harold," she said before rushing up the first flight of stairs.

Carefully, not to ruin the surprise she had for the three boys, she ran up the flights of stairs and found the second door to the left on the third floor. Casting a Disillusionment charm on her self, she quickly opened the door and slipped into the room that the three Marauders were in. Unfortunately, the squeak the door made, caused them to all look up, but seeing nothing, they went back to **her** chocolate. Lily took use of her advantage, put up a couple of privacy charms around the room, took off her Disillusionment charm and began screeching at the boys, who didn't know what hit them.

"HOW DARE YOU BREAK INTO MY HOUSE, STEAL **MY** CHOCOLATE, **AND** EAT IT, I THOUGHT YOU WERE SUPPOSED TO BE THE RESPONSILBE ONE REMUS, OBVIOUSLY NOT! IF YOU THINK YOU CAN STEAL **AND** EAT **MY** CHOCOLATE, YOU'VE GOT ANOTHER THOUGHT COMING, COS THIS IS ALL **MINE**!" and with that, she whipped out her wand again, accioed all the chocolate, made it smaller and stuffed it into her pocket.

The three boys just stood there in shock, whilst Hurricane Lily made her way out of the room and back downstairs, but only after placing a very, _very_ powerful locking charm on the door.

After saying goodbye to Harold and Mrs Potter, she ran back to her own home and into her bedroom, where she sat in front of the window watching the boy's fruitless attempts to open the bedroom door.

Grabbing a pen, she threw it at the window next door, hoping to gain their attention, it worked. She gave them a cheeky, evil grin and sat down to read a book, right in front of the window, to try to annoy the living daylights out of them.

Halfway through this book, Socks flew through the window. Happy that Dumbledore was so quick in replying she detached the scroll, gave Socks an owl treat and opened the letter.

_Dear Miss Evans, _it read._  
I am very curious as to why you wish to transfer to Beauxbatons. As to allowing it, I'm not sure that is a good idea. Beauxbatons has a very different class layout for their students. Not to mention a very full class list. I just haven't got the time to find a new Head Girl and send the letter this close to the new school year. Rest assured if Mr Potter does get in your way during the position, I am very sure that I can find a more suitable Head Boy to your liking. But for now, let's just see.  
Yours Sincerely,  
Albus Dumbledore,  
Headmaster of Hogwarts  
Order of Merlin First Class  
Supreme Mugwump of the International Confederation of Wizards  
etc... _

After reading this, her face fell, 'I haven't got the time,' _well find time. After all, I mustn't be the only suitable candidate in my whole year- oh yeah! I am!_

Then, hearing a whooshing noise, which meant an owl, was on its way, she looked up, and saw a very official-looking ministry owl on the ledge. Curiously she walked over to it, fumbled for a bit over the cords with the scroll and read the letter, not noticing the boys watching the owl fly away.

&&&

"That's a ministry owl that one," Sirius said, saying the first thing since they began watching her. Remus looked up from trying to unlock the door.  
"Yeah, so it is, but don't they only send those owls when someone has -" Remus said watching for James' reaction.  
"Died. Yeah" finished Sirius. James looked up, and then finally, they heard a click, which meant that Remus had finally broken Lily's charm. Quickly they ran through the house and out the door.

&&&

_Dear Miss Evans,  
We are very unfortunate to inform you that your friend; Miss Stacy Baker and her family, have been murdered by Death Eaters at precisely 1.43pm. Many muggles have had to be obliviated at the scene due to the Dark Mark being found over the Surrey home.  
At the Magical Deaths and Mishaps, are sorry about your loss.  
Yours Sincerely,  
Barbara Holhome  
Head of the Magical Deaths and Mishaps Information Office  
Ministry of Magic_

Lily looked up from the paper and saw through her wet eyes that the three Marauders had disappeared from their bedroom. Suddenly the doorbell rang; wiping her tears from her eyes she clutched the letter to her chest and ran down to get rid of whoever bothered her. Opening the door, she saw it was the missing Marauders; she jumped into James' open arms and cried her eyes out onto his shoulder.

James, who had not been expecting this, took a look at the letter in her hand and realized what happened. He motioned for the other two sit down in the lounge room while he carried the still crying Lily onto the couch. Unfortunately, Lily didn't' seem to want to let go, so, being the gentleman that he was, he let her continue to cry on his shoulder, completely aware that when she was finished she would jump away and shout, but for now, he liked this side of the feisty teen.

It took no longer than half an hour for Lily to calm down, so Sirius, who was getting a bit bored, looked at James for his 'okay' then transformed into his shaggy black dog animagus form. Lily took a look at him, laughed a little and gave him a hug. Realizing that James must also be an animagus, she looked him in the eye, waiting for him to transform. Knowing nothing but defeat, James reluctantly transformed into a handsome stag. Lily gasped. James, thinking he did something wrong, transformed back and asked her what happened. She said nothing, but instead transformed into her own animagus form, a gorgeous doe.

James stared at her, mouth open; even Sirius stopped chasing his tail to stare. They both realized that this was no trick, for the doe had the same glare that Lily had, even the green eyes. So James transformed back into his stag and the threesome ran out side into the moonlight, stag and doe nuzzling each other under the half-moon. Meanwhile, Remus stared on, realizing, just this time, he couldn't join in, but now, they had a new member to join their full-moon wanderings. Quietly, he walked back to his mate's house to wait for the three to come back inside. After an hour or two, the two deer came back inside, panting and giggling at what had happened under the stars only moments before. Sirius, who had come back in after five minutes, left the two to themselves, knowing that Lily more than likely needed to talk to James.


	3. Extending A Hand

**Disclaimer:** I do not own it, just playing around in Jo's sandbox.

**A Year To Remember**

**Chapter 3**

**~ Extending a Hand ~**

Lily sat down next to James on the couch and the two looked at one another, still panting from the chasing they had done. Lily the doe had found a small brown rabbit after Sirius had left and began chasing it. James had thought he would lose Lily, so **he **began chasing Lily. To top it all off, the rabbit had seen the magnificent stag and thought it wouldn't mind getting to know the deer so itwas chasing James. After the few hours of chasing each other, they finally stopped to talk. The rabbit, as it turns out was actually an animagus by the name of Frank Longbottom.

Lily had recognised him immediately as the boyfriend of her bestie, Alice. But he had already hopped away.

James looked Lily in the eye and they shared a look. One that neither Sirius nor Remus could determine the meaning of, only they could. Without a word, the two walked upstairs to James' room to talk about it.

"Lily, I'm really sorry for annoying you these past-" James began apologising, but Lily cut him off.

"Don't James," James stared at her, open-mouthed, she had never,**ever** called him by his first name. It was normally Potter, or some other random name she had made up on the spur of the moment, fuelled by her anger at him. "You weren't annoying me," James' mouth hit the floor, "Well, not in that way; it **was **kind of amusing watching your face as I turned you down every 399 times you asked me out."  
James was about to say something stupid, but the words got caught in his mouth, "You counted?"  
"No, Stacy, Alice and Genie did, and then I kinda took over. We recorded every single time in a notebook." Lily replied guiltily.  
James though, just looked plain amused. "How would it be, if you," he hesitated, unsure if he should continue. Lily, however, continued what he was about to say.  
"If I accepted on the 400th try?" she said looking knowingly at James, who nodded. "Well, I must say, it would be a bit of a shock, but then again, now I know you better, and we _are_ living next door to each other, I don't suppose it wouldn't hurt to say yes." She finished.  
James looked up, unsure if he heard correctly, "Does that mean that if I ask you to go out with me right now you'll say yes?"  
"James, were you even listening to me? Of course I will you goose!" Lily answered, laughing slightly.  
"Well in that case, Lily my beautiful flower, will you please go out with me?" he asked convincingly.  
"Of course James, but, I have an idea! Why don't we trick our friends."  
"What do mean? OH! Into thinking you turned me down again!" he paused, thinking for a moment, "You know if we can pull this off, we can wait until we get to school, than at the Welcoming Feast, when they announce the Head Boy and Girl, we can kiss and no-one will have any clue what's going on!"

"And they'll hate us for not telling them, why not!?!" Lily laughed then stopped. "JAMES, HOW DARE YOU EVEN THINK ABOUT IT ASKING ME AGAIN?! I'VE TOLD YOU, TIME AND TIME AGAIN THAT I WILL **NOT **GO OUT WITH YOU! SO HOPEFULLY YOU'LL GET THE PICTURE! NO!" James stood there, completely shocked at this new Lily, but then realised she was already starting their act.  
"But, but Lily, please, I've changed," he 'pleaded', joining in the act, with a complete smile on his face that soon disappeared as he heard footsteps coming up the stairs. Lily heard them too and jumped up, hands on hips, hair wild with 'fury'.  
"OH, SO YOU'VE CHANGED HAVE YOU, WHAT TO? IS IT AN EVEN MORE ANNOYING, SELF-CENEREDABSORBED, BIG-HEADED GIT? I WOULDN'T GO OUT WITH YOU IF IT WAS A CHOICE BETWEEN YOU AND THE GIANT SQUID! DON'T THINK YOU"LL GET ANYWHERE BY ASKING ME AGAIN!" Lily screamed, barely noting the fact that the door had opened.

Sirius walked in, and looked at the scene before him, he gave James a small smile and did the worst thing a person could do; he interrupted Lily whilst she was getting back at James. "Lils, I'm sure he didn't-"  
"DON'T CALL ME LILS!" she shouted, rounding on the new-comer. "AND YOU TELL YOUR IDIOT OF A FRIEND TO **NEVER** ASK ME OUT **AGAIN**!" With that, she walked out of the room, sneaking a smile at a 'shocked' James. She slammed the door, said a quick goodbye to Mr and Mrs Potter, ignored a sorry looking Remus, who had, incidentally, found a new pile of chocolates and was eating a way, and walked out the front door.

Once outside, she walked quickly to her own front door, turned the key and walked inside; she shut the door and began laughing her head off.

"You idiot! Prongs you couldn't resist could you?" Remus yelled at his best friend. Sirius looked as if he might join in yelling at James, but felt he had received enough for one night. James on the other hand, looked right to be ashamed, though inside he was beaming; their plan was working so well!  
"Yeah well, I thought she would actually say yes this time," he said sheepishly.  
"What! You think she would change her mind after saying 'no', 300 times straight?" Sirius said, slightly amused.  
"400," James said without thinking.  
"Excuse me?" Remus asked, not believing his ears.  
"I…er…I said 400. It was the…er…400th time I've asked." James said, looking down.  
"YOU COUNTED!?!?" Remus shouted while Sirius looked plain shocked.  
James just looked away, remembering that those were the exact words he had said.

Lily ran the rest of way to her room and looked out her window. From where she was standing, she could see what looked like James getting yelled at by his friends. She suppressed a smirk and looked 'angrily' at the scene next door.

Deciding that she wanted some 'girl' company until school started up again, she sat down and she wrote a letter to her best friends in the whole entire world, Alice and Imogene, asking if they wanted to come over and stay for the few nights remaining until September the first. Today was the day that they would have received their ministry letters about the fourth member of their gang, Stacy, so they needed to meet up to organise a date for the burial of her family, seeing as both her parents were only children, her mother disowned for marrying a muggle (so out of contact with her parents), her dad's parents had died in a car accident many years before, so these three were the only people really close to the Baker family. (Apart from the parents friends that were out of the country) Lily included in her letter that the boys had moved next door into one of the Potter Houses, unfortunately. She knew that Gen would be excited, her boyfriend being Sirius and all.

Nearly half an hour after she had sent both letters off with Socks, he had retuned with their replies, both noting that they would both be there tomorrow. By now, it was getting late and exciting as it was; the boys fight _was_ become boring. So Lily decided she'd turn in for the night after eating a quick sandwich and shutting the curtains so the boys wouldn't see her getting into bed.

Meanwhile, the boys were beginning to get tired, so they too, decided to hit the sack after they had finished yelling at James.


	4. Encountering the Unknown

**Disclaimer: **Just playing around... not mine.

**A Year To Remember**

**Chapter 4**

**~ Encountering The (Un) Known ~**

Next morning, Lily woke up thinking about James. Cheerfully, she got out of bed, and began making a cup of coffee. But then she remembered what had caused her and James to get together, and that was the news of Stacy's death. Stacy, Imogene, Alice and Lily were the very best of friends; all four of them were in Gryffindor, though surprisingly enough, they would have done extremely well in Ravenclaw.

James, also woke up thinking about Lily, although he didn't need his coffee fix for the morning, he just plain needed his 'Lily fix'. Even though she only agreed to go out with him yesterday, it felt as though they had been apart for years. That wasn't true because she had attempted to avoid him for the past six years, but didn't really succeed.

Back at Lily's house, an hour passed before Ali and Gen arrived, a little breathless from the sensation of apparating, but nevertheless, they were there. Now Lily could finally begin preparations for Stacy and her family's funeral.

The three friends, once four, contacted the ministry with a date and time for the ceremony. Halfway through writing the letter, the doorbell rang. Lily instantly rose, but Ali told her to sit down while she got it instead.

"James? What are you doing here? Don't answer that," she said, just as he was about to open his mouth to answer. "LILY!" she called up the stairs, "YOU HAVE A VISITOR!!" Lily rose again, Imogene, not wanting to be left behind, rose as well and followed her to the front door.

As Lily neared the door, her mouth fell open, slyly; she gave James a small wink and began ranting. "POTTER! WHO THE HELL DO YOU THINK YOU ARE! FIRST YOU MOVE NEXT DOOR TO ME, BREAK IN AND STEAL **ALL **MY CHOCOLATES AND THEN YOU COME _WALTZING_ OVER HERE LIKE YOU OWN THE PLACE! YOU BETTER HAVE A GOOD REASON FOR COMING HERE OR I **WILL **HEX YOU INTO OBLIVION!" Lily took a deep breath before continuing, "YOU HAVE FIVE SECONDS TO GET OUT OF HERE, FIVE, FOUR, THR–"

"LILY!" James interrupted, speaking at last, "I wasn't here for you," Lily automatically quietened to hear what he had to say, the others looking at her curiously. "I've actually come here to ask all _three _of you to the Marauder's Back to School Party tomorrow night, and no, I didn't choose to invite you, my parents did," he added to answer the unasked question.

Lily looked as if she were ready to disagree immediately so Imogene said, "Sure, we'll be there, what time?" James' eyes lit up, "Er…6pm…and…er"

"Do we bring dates?" Alice asked, thinking about Frank.

"Yes, but no muggles that don't know bout our world, it would be kind of hard to explain the magic…Actually, speaking of dates, Lily–"

"NO JAMES!" she shouted before he had a chance to ask. Her two best friends stared at her, realising she had said his first name, she blushed a deep crimson.

"Lils, give him a break, it's his party after all tomorrow," Alice said.

"NO! Tell him to give **me** a break. And don't call me Lils!" with that, Lily stomped back upstairs, eyes full of laughter that only James could see.

"Don't worry James; we'll make her dance at least once with you tomorrow night. Could you tell Sirius for me that he's going to it with me? Whether he likes it or not!? I would tell him myself, but I kinda need to stay with Lily," Imogene said

"Sure, oh, and can you tell Lily that the theme is 'Muggle Costumes' for me, she kinda ran away too quickly."

"COOL!!! Yeah, we'll tell her," the girls said in unison, before looking at each other in amazement and laughing.

James shook his head at the two girls, "I swear you two are twins in everyway but blood!'

"I think we've heard that –"

"– Once –"

"– Or twice –"

"– or maybe a million times!"

James laughed at their antics. "Well, I gotta go, thanks you two."

"Bye!" they said in unison before laughing again.

"Bye!" he said, walking back to his own house, now knowing that he had at least once dance tomorrow night to tell her how great an actress she was to pull this whole thing off.

As soon as they other two went back upstairs, they bullied Lily into coming shopping with them for a new costume for the party, Lily reluctantly agreed. And so within half and hour, the three were on the streets of muggle London ready to try on costumes and dresses galore. After visiting fifteen shops, trying on twenty dresses each, and wasting three hours shopping, they finally made their way to Diagon Alley. There, they decided to visit Fortescue's Ice-cream Parlour. After eating their ice-creams (Lily – Raspberry and White Choc, Alice – Cookies and Cream, and Imogene – Boysenberry), they thought they should finish their shopping for school, seeing as they hadn't had a chance to all summer. After a quick stop at Gringotts, the trio made their way to Madam Malkin's for new robes, (Lily's were getting a bit short), the Apothecary and Eelop's for new potion supplies and owl treats. Then followed by Flourish and Blotts l

Upon entering the bookshop, the three separated with plans to meet up within the hour, Ali headed off to the Herbology section, Gen off to the Care of Magical Creatures and Lily to the Charm section that adjoined the Transfiguration one. Once there, they each picked a book and proceeded to read, it was only when Lily heard a cough behind her half and hour later that she looked up. To her delight, it was her boyfriend. Jumping up, she leapt into his arms and laughed.

"Shhh Lily, someone might see us," he whispered, trying not to laugh himself. Lily reluctantly got off him down and sat back down in her armchair.

"I'm guessing my friends have tried setting us up again haven't they?" Lily asked.

"Yeah they have," he agreed.

"And you do know that I'm going to have to reject you at _least _four times for it to be considered normal." James nodded.

"As long as you end up dancing with me, I'm fine with it."

"I can't wait to see their faces on September first." James laughed.

"No-one's going to know what hit them!"

"Jamie, we're going to have to plan this you know."

"What did you have in mind?"

"Where's Lily? Have you seen her Ali?" asked Imogene. The pair were standing outside Flourish and Blotts looking for their missing friend. "She said she'd only be an hour at max, and it's been more than an hour already."

"No Gen, I've told you already I haven't see– WAIT! There she is!"

Lily came walking out of the bookshop, followed by James only metres behind. "Uh oh" whispered Alice. Only seconds later, Lily 'noticed' that James was behind her.

"DO YOU HAVE TO FOLLOW ME **EVERYWHERE**? LEAVE ME ALONE POTTER!" James quickly backed off so to not make a scene in a very busy Diagon Alley. "Girls, lets go!" All three of them quickly walked off to the Leaky Cauldron.

"What did he do Lily?" asked Alice as soon as they'd made it to the brick wall. Lily turned to look at her friend,

"What do you mean Alice?" she asked dreamily, Imogene giggled as it was so obvious.

'Hmmm, let me think?!" she laughed. Lily snapped out of her trance and looked at Alice.

"Well he was obviously stalking me, he followed us into the bookshop and started looking at the same section as me! I didn't even know that idiot could read!" Imogene laughed at the look on Alice's face.

"He wasn't stalking, gosh Lily! Give the guy a chance," said Alice.

'Nope, don't feel like it. Besides, when did you start defending Potter anyway?" said Lily, sticking her nose up into the air.

"Excuse me, what would you like to order?" interrupted a waitress once they'd sat down at the very full pub. All three of them jumped at the intruder before realising who it was.

"When did you start working here, Mary?" Lily asked her fellow classmate.

"Start of the hols. Now do you mind ordering so I can make some money today," snapped Mary.

Alice, Imogene and Lily looked at each other raising their eyebrows. "Erm I'll have a butterbeer," ordered Lily, breaking the silence,

"Me, too," said Alice.

"Make it three" said Imogene.

After Mary left, Lily said, "Well look who's in a grumpy mood today." The other two laughed knowing that Mary was nearly **always **in a grumpy mood.

"Here you go," Mary said before slamming the three drinks down and walking away. Lily merely raised her eyebrows at the other two before taking a sip.

"Tastes normal," she said, noticing their expression. Realising that this was not it, she turned around and followed their gazes, "Oh no, not again," she whispered.

"Guess he was stalking you Lils," Imogene said apoplectically while Alice nodded in agreement.

"Would you like me to say 'I told you so'? And DON'T call me Lils!"

"No, and very sorry, I forgot."

Lily scowled at Imogene before turning around to look at James. She sighed, which unfortunately, Alice and Imogene noticed and exchanged glances before looking at Lily's expression again.

"What are you two looking at?" Lily asked after a minute or two.

"You like him."

"What? No, duh, I hate him!"

"Yeah we know you hate him, which is why you like him!"

"Yeah, WHAT!"

"LILY LIKES JAMES!" Imogene said in a sing song voice. Lily just plain scowled at her friend, neither denying nor agreeing with the comment.

Unfortunately, James heard this comment, which was an absolute miracle, seeing as it was a full pub, and walked over to their table with Sirius, Remus and Peter by his side.

"I heard that Lils," James said smartly.

"DON'T CALL ME LILS!" Lily yelled. James flinched and mumbled that he 'forgot about that'. "Besides, it's not true as I have told everyone **so **many times that it's impossible to count, I do NOT like you POTTER!!"

&&&

Meanwhile, Sirius was talking to his girlfriend Imogene on the other side of the table.

"So Siri, would you mind explaining to me why Peter wasn't with you at James' house for the past week but then shows up with you the day before the party?"

"Well Gen, Wormtail here was, erm, Wormy, where were you?" Sirius asked his buddy while Remus rolled his eyes at Sirius.

"I was, er, at my aunties house in, er, France." He said nervously. Imogene thought she saw something in his eyes, but whatever it was, she ignored it.

"Oh, okay, did you have a good time?" she asked.

"Er, kind of. My auntie and uncle were really nice, as usual, but my cousins were terrible," he said, obviously making it up on the spot.

"Right, anyway, what do you think we should do about Lily?"

"What do you mean?" asked Sirius. Remus actually started to pay attention to the conversation and said:

"Isn't it obvious Padfoot, the party!"

"Oh yeah, sorry, stupid moment," he said, Remus rolled his eyes at Imogene, "Well, have you guys got any ideas for setting her up with him?"

"Alice and I have promised James that we would get him at least one dance with him, so chances are they'd get together, unless…"

"What is it Gen?" asked Sirius.

"We could always–"

&&&

Mary made her way over to Lily, Ali and Gen's table to collect their empty glasses, as soon as she saw the Marauder's her eyes widened in excitement. "How can I help you boys?" she said in a sugary sweet voice.

"Nothing, we're just passing through with these lovely ladies," Sirius said in a pompous manner. Imogene laughed at his antics. Mary just plain scowled; she was certainly **not**having a good day today.

The girls grabbed their bags and moved towards the door leading to Muggle London. Lily decided she'd be sneaky and jumped into an available fireplace and said clearly, "Evan's residence". After a few seconds, everyone realised she'd disappeared so they bean looking for her. Ali, seeing a green fireplace indicating someone had left, whispered to Imogene and pointed. They too followed their friend after topping up the floo powder.

The remaining Marauders, with nothing better to do, grabbed all of their bags and followed the girls. What they weren't prepared for was the welcoming at the other end. Lily was **not **happy!


	5. Facing the Facts

**Disclaimer:** Not mine. Don't own it.

**A Year To Remember**

**Chapter 5**

**~ Facing the Facts ~**

"What was that about Lily?" asked Alice as soon as they'd floo'd out of the Leaky Cauldron. Lily turned to look at her friend,

"What do you mean Alice?" she asked, Imogene giggled as it was so obvious.

"Duh, you ran out of the Leaky Cauldron, obviously to get away from the love of your life."

"Who? Severus?" Lily asked jokingly, laughing at the terrified looks on their faces. "Nah, if you mean Potter, get real, as if _he'd _be the love of my life! I hate him!" she exclaimed, though inside, she was secretly agreeing with the. She didn't know how much longer she'd be able to keep this charade up. Thankfully, there was only a few more days until the train ride to school, and the big announcement that they and planned for their friends and teachers.

"You are absolutely gross if you can even think of going out with that slimy git Lily, don't forget, he did call you that awful word back in fifth year." Lily laughed but soon stopped as she saw the fireplace turn green again. Staring curiously, she ignored her friends and moved closer to the fire. Staring curiously, she ignored her friends and moved closer to the fireplace.

Alice and Imogene stopped talking as she was so close to the fire that she was almost in it. They both realised straight away who was about to come through, but, catching each others eye and hiding a grin, they realised that Lily hadn't!

With all of this happening in a matter of seconds, James, Sirius, Remus and Peter were all spinning though the floo network. With a flash of green light, James, who'd led the way, burst out into Lily's house, right on top of Lily. Lily didn't have time to move away when she saw James come spinning into view, so there she was, flat on her back with James lying on top of her, grinning his head off.

As he was making no obvious move to get up, she grunted and squirmed, but James remained put. Suddenly they heard a cough, looking behind him, James saw Sirius looking at him with awe written all over his face, "Wow Prongs, you really know how to get the girls, don't you!" Lily rolled her eyes at this and opened her mouth to say something. But it soon became clear that James had unknowingly cast a _Silencio _charm at her to prevent any arguing she might do. Fury written all over her face, she squirmed under his body weight. She then went to grab her wand, but it seemed he had taken it from her and given it to Sirius who held it up for her to see.

At the nod of his head, Sirius, Remus, Peter and soon enough, Ali and Gen, all walked out of the room, leaving James and Lily. Once they were gone, and the door was shut, James took the spell of Lily. As predicted, she began yelling out utter nonsense at him, "Get off me now you great baboon …" but was soon shut up with a very loud kiss from James. Lily, who couldn't resist herself, responded in delight. Upon hearing this, Sirius, Remus, Ali and Gen each gave a whoop of laughter, whilst Peter looked confusedly at everyone.

"Did I miss something?" he asked to no-one in particular.

No-one answered him.

It appeared that Lily had 'returned' to her senses and immediately began yelling at him. After all, it was the only thing that her friends would even slightly believe. But alas, she was promptly shut up by another of James' _Silencio'_s.

Lily gave a sly grin to James who returned it with his own cheeky one, and she quickly put on a grumpy face to storm out of the room with. She promptly stomped out of the room, into the next one to grab her wand off Sirius, only to run off upstairs to her bedroom to apply a non-verbal version of the counter-charm.

As soon as Lily had left the room, James had followed her and watched the dramatic (silent) exit from the room. Once she'd gone upstairs, he sighed and said 'hi' to Sirius who glared at him profusely. James sighed once again and turned away, remembering the brief moment they had shared in a few days. Although he knew that he would be able to steal her away at his party the following night, it wouldn't last. He was sure that no doubt, _someone_ would figure it out.

"James? Hello, anyone home?" Sirius said worriedly, waving his hand in front of James' face.

James snapped out of his daydream turning to Sirius, he said, "What? Isn't a guy around here allowed to think about hot girls every once in a while?" Sirius had to laugh at this. It was true, James and Sirius spent endless amounts of class time in particular thinking about girls.

"Of course doofus, but not when you've upset red-head up there," he jabbed his thumb in the direction of the stairs, "Go say … sorry or something."

"Ok, one thing a Potter can _not _do, say sorry for something that wasn't their fault, she was asking for it, standing to close to the fireplace like that." Sirius sighed; his best mate was _never _going to win Lily's heart if he kept this up.

Silently, James gathered the Marauders up and headed next door for a drink of butterbeer that they missed out on in order to follow the girls.

"Merlin Prongs, what is wrong with you?" Sirius said, "How can you always manage to stuff things up with Lils?" James looked at him in such an evil way that Sirius promptly shut up. James meanwhile ran in his room and shut the door behind him. _Only two days left_, he thought.

&&&

Ali and Gen watched the Marauders leave the house and decided to go check on their best buddy who was sulking in her room. "Hey Lils, are you okay?" they both asked in unison. Lily looked at both of them, with evident surprise on both their faces.

"Are you sure you two didn't plan that?" they both shook their heads and all three of them laughed.

"Let's watch a movie!" Lily said after much thinking of what to do, Ali and Gen agreed, Ali set off to make the popcorn, Gen to get the drinks and Lily to find a good movie.

Five minutes later, the three friends were sitting in front of the TV with a big bowl of popcorn, cans of butterbeer and packets of lollies and were waiting for their movie to begin.

"Have you got everything ready for the party dear?" Mrs Potter asked.

"Yes mother, but really the question should be whether you have everything ready for the party?" James answered. For the party, James was wearing a Prince Charming costume that looked like it came straight out of Disney.

"Ha ha, very funny James," she said, watching all four Marauders laugh their heads off before giving in and joining them.

"What's going on in here?" boomed Mr Potter over the noise of five laughing people. Everyone immediately fell silent before James said:

"Well Dad, Mum started it," he said cheekily, his mother gave him a reproachful look but said nothing.

"Hmmm, I can actually believe that," he said, sharing a look with his wife, smiling. James looked from one to the other confusedly.

"Anyone care to expla–"

"Long story son, maybe another time, for now let's just wait for your guests to arrive."

"Okay," James answered as the doorbell rang, "Wonder who that could be?" he said, still standing there.

"James?" his father said.

"Yeah Dad?"

"Go get the door!"

"OH! Right of course!" he exclaimed before running to meet his guests. This time, his father couldn't resist the temptation to roll his eyes.

"Hey Potter, great party," Lily said sulking, though her eyes were smiling with joy at finally being at the party. It had taken three very long hours of getting ready and her 'I don't want to go' act to finally leave the house. She handed over (or attempted to) the food she'd promised to bring, but James was far to distracted to notice and take it from her outstretched hands, he was far to busy staring at what she was wearing. James and his fellow Marauders had decided to hold a Muggle Costume Party for the main purpose that the guests wouldn't stand out to much on the streets that might be seen by neighbouring Muggles. Ali was wearing a costume similar to the one worn by 'Alice' from 'Alice in Wonderland' while Frank came as the White Rabbit. Imogene came as 'Belle' from 'Beauty and the Beast' with Sirius dressed in the likes of the heartless Beast. But Lily, she was the most spectacular in James' eyes. She was wearing a sparkling blue Cinderella dress, complete with the glass slippers.

"What? Don't you want it?" she said, pulling back the warm plate.

"No, no, of course I want it! Who do you think I am?" he said, snapping back to reality. Lily reluctantly handed the plate back over, to which he grabbed greedily before saying, "Thank you Lily, and for coming as well," he smiled, and then continued, "You look terrific tonight." Lily immediately blushed, _'NO STOP LILY! YOU'RE SUPPOSED TO HATE HIM! Remember? PFFT, Forget it.' _she thought, all previous thoughts of telling him off for using the name 'Lils' were forgotten. Staring off into the distance she thought about ditching the party with him and running away together. She sighed audibly, knowing that this wasn't going to happen.

"Erm, Lils?" James called worriedly, hoping that she'd be able to cover this up, because, evidently, she had forgotten all of their friends, (Ali, Gen, Peter, Remus, Sirius and Frank) were surrounding them. Lily quickly cut short her fantasy daydream and almost squealed.

"DON'T CALL ME LILS!!!" Ali and Gen laughed, THIS was the Lily they knew, not even _they _were allowed to called her 'Lils' nowadays without having their heads bitten off.

"Right this way ladies, and gentleman," James suddenly remembered his manners and ushered the three girl and Frank though the door, his own friends trailing behind.

Very soon, more guests arrived and after a brief welcoming from Mr and Mrs Potter, and then the Marauders, the band started up. Looking over to one of the far corners of the room, Lily saw that Ali, Frank, Sirius, Gen, Remus and Peter were all standing in a group huddle, whispering. _'They must be trying to set us up again, ha-ha, that's funny!'_ Lily thought, smirking a little. She caught James' eye in the crowd and nodded in the direction of their friends. James nodded back at her and bounded over to where they were standing.

"Wotcher all doing?!" James randomly asked his and Lily's best friends, causing them to jump a couple of feet into the air.

"Blimey James!" Sirius said on behalf of the entire group that had broken their huddle upon his abrupt arrival. "You bloody scared the jeepers out of me-well, us! Don't you come with a warning bell or something?"

"Not that I know of…Now, answer the question!" James said happily, bouncing around his friends.

"Okay, okay Mr Annoying Prongs. We're trying to find a way to get Lily to dance with you. AND, if we're luck, fall in love with you. It's so damn obvious tat she likes you, yet she's STILL pretending she hates you!" The others nodded in agreement.

"I have an idea!" James said excitedly. "You all know how she's bound to say no a couple of times?" the group nodded again. "Well what I'm thinking is that after she says no the first time, we'll get Frank to –"

&&&

"Hey Lily!" a familiar voice called nearest her. Lily swung around tho find and greet its owner.

"Bertha?! What are you doing here?" she asked, confused a little by her classmates appearance.

"Nice to see you too. In case you hadn't noticed, our entire year has been invited, DUH! And unfortunately mine and James' parents are good friends, so they'd kill me if I didn't come tonight; even though I'd much rather stay home, away from the stupid prats." Bertha exclaimed, her dirty blonde hair flailing around wildly.

"You really hate him, don't you?" Lily asked.

"Of course I do! He and his bloody friends prank me every second nowadays; it drives me up the wall! I suppose I hate him as much as you do, but for a different reason!" Bertha said, tossing her wild hair over her shoulder.

"Yeah, I guess so," Lily answered uncomfortably, knowing full well that her loathing of James was extinct.

'LILS!" a male's voice cried from across the room.

"DON'T CALL ME LILS!" she screamed back.

"Fine, Lily then, will you dance with me?" James' voice yelled at her. _'I cannot say yes, I hate him, remember?' _I she thought to herself desperately.

"What do you think I'm going to say?" she cried irritably.

"Yes?"

"NO!" Frustrated, she said goodbye to Bertha and walked over to Ali, Frank, Gen and Sirius.

"Hey Lily?" asked Frank.

"Yeah Frank?" she replied, still angry and frustrated at James.

"Do you wanna dance with me?" he asked nervously.

"What? Of course, if that's okay with Ali…" she trailed off, watching for Ali's reaction, she nodded, "…Sure, I'm all for it."

Lily immediately calmed down as she walked with her friend's boyfriend to the dance floor.

All too soon, the dance ended and a slower song began. Frank said bye and walked back over to Ali. But before he had gone two steps, James had walked over to them, and said gracefully, "Frank, you don't mind if I dance with Cinderella here, do you?"

Frank agreed, and ignoring Lily's silent pleas, said, "Sure."

Turning to Lily, James said, "Lily, may I please have the honour of this dance?"

"Er, no, Frank and I were just about to –"

"No Lily," Frank interrupted, "I gotta go back to Ali now, you go ahead and dance with James here," with that, Frank left the scene.

Lily stared at James with a fixed glare. Reluctantly she placed her hands on James shoulders, one-by-one. James followed suit by placing his on her waist.

"Great party James," she said to break the silence that had drifted between them since Frank's departure.

"Thanks. Do you have any–?"

"Idea how much I can't wait for tomorrow evening?" she finished for him, "I think so."

"Hey Lils?" he asked.

Just this once, she ignored his used of the forbidden nickname. The only true person to have ever been able to use it without having their heads bitten off was her father, and he was dead. And so was that nickname, it reminded her too much of her loss. "Yeah?"

"I love you."

"I love you too," she replied, barely able to resist laying her head against him, she held back though, knowing that nearly everyone was watching them dance.

"You know, you're a very good actress."

"I'm sorry?" she questioned, thoroughly confused by his random comment.

"To pull this off, you're a very good actress to make up that kind of stiff up on the spot," he explained. Suddenly, his comment wasn't all that random.

"So are you," she argued softly.

"Not as god as you though," he replied.

"Oh, thanks."

"Quite alright," she replied. After a slight pause, she continued, "Stacy's funeral was today, you know?" she said sadly.

"Yeah I do," he answered, just as sadly.

"I still can't believe she isn't going to come back."

"Just think of it, as a long holiday."

"That she forgot to say goodbye to her best friend beforehand." By now, Lily was on the verge of tears.

"A wise old man once told me that to the well-organised mind, death is but the next great adventure," he said soothingly.

"Was this 'wise old man' a bit barmy?" she asked.

James just chuckled.

"Well, it **was **Dumbledore," he answered.

"I suppose so."

Quite soon, the song was over, and so was the conversation and dance. With a quick smile at James, Lily detached herself from his arms and hurried towards her best friends on the opposite side if the room.

"How was it?" Gen asked.

"Terrible," she replied, "He wouldn't stop talking about all the pranks he'd ever done. Honestly, as if I'd care!" she exclaimed. Out of the corner of her eyes, she watched for Sirius; reaction. As predicted he made a noise and bee-lined to his best mate.

"You IDIOT Prongs! Why on earth were you talking about pranks the whole time?" he yelled at James.

"What? OH!" James said in realization.

"She just told us mate." Sirius said to him. So this was the amazing cover story she'd come up with! He had to admit, it was pretty good, and the 'old' Prongs would have spent hours talking about the greatest pranks he'd ever pulled to Lily, not noticing that she didn't care.

After little more than five trick chairs – courtesy of the Marauders, three couples caught kissing on the dance floor – now sporting neon green hair, and a massive mad dash for cake – resulting in, well, no more cake, it was finally time for the guests to go home. Once their entire year level was out the door, James finally got to say goodbye to Lily and her friends who had stayed behind.

"Are you SURE you don't want a hand cleaning up, Mrs Potter?" Gen and Ali asked at the same time.

"No, no, I'm fine. Now, are you two twins, which one's older?" she asked curiously. The two girls in question looked at each other and laughed.

"They aren't twins Mrs Potter, though, half the time I think that they are twins in everyway but blood." Lily exclaimed. Ali and Gen laughed again.

"We get that ALL the time!" they said, before bursting into another round of giggles.


	6. A CloakAndDagger

**Disclaimer:** Not mine, don't own it.

**A Year To Remember**

**Chapter 6**

**~ A Cloak-and-Dagger ~**

The next morning, Lily and her friends got up early to get to Kings Cross on time. They figured that it would be easier to just apparate to the platform rather than take muggle transport. Ali's parents and Gen's parents were meeting them there to say goodbye.

&&&

Meanwhile the Marauders and James' parents were taking the floo to the Leaky Cauldron and walking over to the station as they had done in previous years. Thankfully, all four boys were seventeen and therefore allowed to perform shrinking spells on their luggage, with the exception of pets, so to not carry around four trunks.

At precisely 10.29am, the Marauders and Potters arrived at Platform 9¾. The Marauders' parents were all there to say goodbye to their sons. Within the next few minutes, the girls' apparated straight onto the platform, appearing only a metre away from the boys. This caused them to jump up in shock; the sight of the 'invincible' Marauders shocked made nearly half the parents surrounding them to laugh at the rarity of scaring the 'invincible' Marauders..

Finally the whistle blew and, after saying final goodbyes to their parents, the girls and the Marauders boarded the train. Lily and her friends dragged their trunks into an empty compartment and sat down. An hour after leaving Kings Cross, the snack lady came by with sweets.

Not to long after she'd left, and they were finishing off the last Chocolate Frog, the Marauders waltzed into the girls' compartment. Lily inwardly groaned, she was not feeling herself today. For some odd reason, she couldn't be bothered to yell at him. But she did it anyway, even if it was only half-heartedly. She screamed and yelled at the intruders so loud that people five carriages away had to block their ears, to save their eardrums from a terrible fate. It went on like this for at least five minutes before suddenly, Lily burst into tears.

Everyone in their compartment just stared at their friend for a few minutes, as they hadn't a clue what had caused the sudden mood swing. James quickly clued on to the reasoning by just a quick glance into her bloodstained eyed. He didn't, however, feel the trouble their friends with it, so quickly left when Gen finally ushered the boys out so they could comfort her.

"Are you okay Lily?" Ali asked gently sometime later, as her sobs subsided a little. Ali and Gen had situated themselves on either side of Lily, an arm draped over each shoulder from her friends.

'Stacy' was all the girls had managed to get from her before she burst into tears. Now they finally understood. Stacy was Lily's best friend and vice versa. The two had lived in the same area growing up together, went to Muggle Primary School together and found out they were witches at relatively the same time. Their parents had been friends when they were at school, so the Baker and Evans families were very close, constantly together, doing everything with each other. Stacy and Lily had befriended 'that Snape kid from Spinners End' after learning of his horrible home life when they were all nine. Originally, they were a trio; Petunia, Lily and Stacy were inseparable – before Severus and Hogwarts came about anyway. But now, when news of Stacy's death came about, Lily had stayed strong for everyone else's sake, but never let herself grieve. So this outburst was to be expected, for her father's tragic death had occurred only weeks before hand and her only remaining family thought her to be a freak, unworthy of anything even comfort.

After comforting Lily for a while, Ali and Gen moved out of the compartment to give the Marauders a piece of their mind. But once the door closed behind them, an invisible figure waited until they were on the other end of the train before slipping into the compartment. He whipped off his Invisibility Cloak to reveal himself. Lily looked up to see who it was.

"James!" she ran into his arms and continued to weep into his robes.

"Lily, shh, if your friends find out that I'm here, I'll be toast." Lily giggled slightly.

"I just can't handle it anymore, I mean, just before that letter came, we were supposed to meet up, and we've always sat next to each other on the _Hogwarts Express_. I miss her so much." Lily choked back another sob, "And with Dad dead, Petunia not talking to me, I dunno what to do, my whole life's fallen apart."

"Lily," James said quietly, she looked up, "You've still got us: me, the Marauders, Ali and Gen. We're still here for you, for each other." She smiled and whispered a small 'thanks'.

Silently the door slid open again. Lily and James stood stock still. Then, slowly, it slid shut again. James took the opportunity to whip out his cloak again and cover himself with it. Both him and Lily were straining their ears to hear the voices outside their door.

"Where the hell is Potter? I mean, I saw him coming out of our compartment, but the guys say that he never went into theirs. I swear, if he's gone to annoy our Lilikins, I will personally chop him up and use him in a potion." James winced, "He's done enough damage as it is," a voice said.

"Don't be too harsh Ali," Ali hmphed but instead of responding, she slid open the door and walked in.

"So, what happened?" Lily snapped. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw a glimpse of sliver shoot through the doorway.

"Same old Lily," Ali and Gen muttered, now sitting next to each other on the seat opposite her.

"Must you two do that?" Lily said irritably, "I'm getting rather confused as to whether you're twins or not now, it's driving me crazy!" Ali and Gen just grinned.

Silence befell upon the trio. Various games of Exploding Snap, Wizards Chess and an assortment of muggle games amused them for the remaining hours on the train. Lily left for her Head Girl duties from time-to-time, while her friends talked, ate lollies, and basically talked. Eventually, Ali spotted the castle while looking at the landscape rolling past. They put on their school robes and gathered up their belongings. Owls were shut un cages, books in trunks.

Telling her friends to save her a seat in their carriage, to which they gave her confused looks, "Hello? I'm Head Girl!" she rushed over to stop a fight involving a couple of second years near the exit on the train. By the time she got there however, James had already broken the boys up and the traffic of students was flowing properly again.

&&&

Once everyone was seated, Professor McGonagall began the Sorting, As the students were called up to the hat, whispers broke out between Ali and Gen. Lily knew that she should stop them, but she honestly couldn't be bothered, it wasn't as if they were hurting anybody, were they?

When the first one to make it into Gryffindor, 'Brown, Charlie' was called out, everyone on the table cheered.

"How do you reckon they've written the heads' speech?" Ali whispered to Gen, "I mean, it's not as if she'd be able to sit down with him to write it. And HE wouldn't do it by owl."

"I dunno Ali," Gen replied as 'Elliott, Katherine' made Gryffindor and 'Good, Camille' became the third Hufflepuff of the evening. "She may have just written the whole thing and just sent him a copy."

"Nah, he wouldn't use hers, he'd have written his own." Ali argued. "Hey, I think I know that girl!" she pointed at the 'Heath, Isabella' awaiting the Sorting Hat's final verdict.

"Really?"

"Yeah, she's muggleborn; she was my buddy back in Muggle Primary School."

"But why'd you got to Muggle Primary School, you're pureblood." Gen inquired just as Isabella became a Gryffindor.

"My parents wanted me to. Dunno why ask them," Ali said. "Now can we go back to what we were talking about?"

"And that was…?" Gen said jokingly.

Ali made a funny noise in the back of her throat, causing Lily to look at her sharply before looking back to watch the ceremony.

"Never mind."

"Ok… hey look, there's my cousin!" Gen said loudly so that Lily heard.

"Which one?" Lily asked, hearing her.

"'Kerezsi, Samuel,'" called Professor McGonagall.

"That one," said Gen, as a brown-haired, tall boy nervously walked up to the stool and sat down. Almost immediately, the hat called out, 'Ravenclaw!' "Always said he'd get that, but did he listen, NO!!" she mumbled under her breath. The next girl, 'Lim, Kristine,' also became a Ravenclaw. The next two girls became a Slytherin and Hufflepuff respectively.

"'Phillips, Emily!'" Professor McGonagall called out. A brunette girl walked up to the stool.

"Hey! I know her!" Ali said, remembering what her Mum said. "She's my Mum's friend's kid. I've met her a couple of times. She's really nice." Lily and Gen shared glances.

"GRYFFINDOR!!" the hat shouted. Ali moved over a seat almost instantly and called the poor girl over. But Emily, seeing a familiar face, rushed over and, as quickly as she could, sat down next to her.

The rest of the Sorting flew by. Occasionally they would stop their whispered introductions and conversations to listen to a few of the first years be sorted. Names like 'Sibley, Gordon' (Ravenclaw!) came up and went to their appropriate tables.

Emily looked up when her friend: 'Walsh, Holly' became a Gryffindor and called her over. Holly was rather small for a first year, had blonde curly hair and a warm but nervous smile. A pair of twins went up next. Instead of going up one-by-one, they walked up in sync and sat down back-to-back on the stool, the hat over both their heads. And that is how Stephanie and Matthew Young became Gryffindors.

Finally, after 'Zale, Anna' became a Ravenclaw, Professor McGonagall took both stool and hat away and came back to take her own seat at the High Table.


	7. Revelations

**Disclaimer: **Not mine, don't own it.

**A Year To Remember**

**Chapter 7**

**~ Revelations ~**

"Welcome back old hands, to our new ones, Welcome! There is a time for speeches, but this is not it. For now, let the feast begin!" Dumbledore opened his hands in a welcoming gesture and suddenly the food appeared on the table.

"I will never get used to that happening Padfoot, six years I've been here, and I still am amazed!" James said, rather dumbly looking at his food.

"Gushtfetor Phppoogd," Sirius replied, mouth already at bursting point.

"Eeewwww," Lily, Alice and Imogene squealed at the same time, grossed out by Sirius' lack of 'normalness'.

As soon as the dessert had disappeared, Dumbledore stood up again and began his Start-Of-Year speech. After the usual announcement about the Forbidden Forest, to which the Marauders grinned, he introduced the new Head Girl and Boy, James and Lily took this as their cue to stand up and make their way to the platform.

"Well it's a pleasure to be here everyone, I'm sure we're going to have a fantastic year and I–" James began.

"_I_ hope that we don't have to tell everyone off for pulling pranks _Potter!_" James looked away, ashamed.

"Anyway, we all hope that everyone _studies_ for our exa–" here he put a big emphasis, which earned him a scoff from Lily.

"I didn't know that word was in your vocabulary Potter!" Lily fake sneered.

McGonagall looked at Dumbledore angrily "It's your fault those two are up there doing this," she whispered. Dumbledore had at least got the decency to look ashamed.

"Before I was so _rudely _interrupted, I was going to say, that we all hope you all have fun this year, we certainly have been preparing a couple of things that you might enjoy, such as the Yule Ball this Christmas and the Hallowe–"

"POTTER! I was going to say that, you PROMISED I could! Apologise NOW!" Lily screamed at her boyfriend.

"Er… sorry?" he questioned, a scared look on his face, because now that he had Lily fired up, and nobody would ever _dare_ fire Lily up _and _stay in the same room with her, well nobody but James.

The entire school had been watching the argument like a tennis match, heads moving back and forth to each speaker. But now, they only wanted to run. Knowing Lily, Alice and Imogene knew that this was a very good time to want to be out of the room very soon, for she was sure to explode.

"NOT GOOD ENOUGH!!" she yelled.

"Then what do you want me to do, get on my hands and knees?" he asked back, obviously 'frightened' but knowing that this was the good part.

"That is actually a good idea," she said thoughtfully, everyone got prepared for the worst, "NOPE, THIS IS WHAT I WANT YOU TO DO!" With that she yanked James towards her. James had been waiting for it, but couldn't help yelping in surprise. What the rest of the school soon realised, was that she had pulled him in for a long, passionate kiss, filled with every bit of longing that she couldn't give him for the past two months.

Moments later, they pulled apart and grinned at the confused looks on the schools faces. Every student and teacher alike had been holding their breath for the explosion, but it never came. As soon as they worked it out, James grabbed Lily for another kiss, this one much longer. It wasn't until a certain Headmaster gave a small cough behind them that they pulled apart once again.

Soon enough, the school erupted into cheers, with a sixth year from Hufflepuff yelling out "TOOK EM' LONG ENOUGH!" every one laughed, but a look from Lily shut them up, instead they just clapped harder. When it seemed the clapping was not going to stop, after two minutes, of which time Lily and James were both beginning to get very bored of standing in front of the school when they could be getting to bed, they each looked at Dumbledore, words of pleading written on their faces. Thankfully, he took this as a cue and bellowed, "SILENCE!" Immediately the entire school stopped and a grin returned to Dumbledore's face. "I believe it is time you all went to bed, for you all want to be up nice and early for classes tomorrow," here the school groaned, "Goodnight."

Dumbledore sat back down and waited for the school to stand up and begin piling out of the Great Hall before saying to McGonagall and the rest of his fellow staff members, "I believe you _all _owe me twenty gallons!" All the teachers groaned and started to pull the money out of their pockets. Dumbledore grinned at the huge pile of money growing in front of him, before grabbing the lot and heading for his quarters and a nice bag of lemon drops.

Once the school was dismissed from the feast, Lily and James led the way out the hall, hand-in-hand. Many whispers were trailing behind them from various students. But the corridors quietened once more once the Head Girl shot a fierce look behind her. The Marauders, Ali and Gen, not to mention Frank – who seemed to have glued himself onto the two groups – continued their whispers and occasionally shot their own glares at the couple's backs before returning to their huddle. James and Lily were leading their fellow Griffindors to the Common Room, Soon they were moving quickly to the Fat Lady's portrait.

"Flobberworm," Lily said confidently. The portrait swung open and the Head Girl and Boy stood to the side to allow everyone else to scramble through the hole before them.

As her friends past her, they cast her a firm glare. Of all the things she knew would happen tonight, she knew her friends reactions would hurt the most. She and James knew that they would be less than pleased that they didn't know, but especially since they had spent the past few days together. Sighing she waited until the last person had gone through before stepping forwards with James right behind her.

Upon their reappearance, most people in the Common Room looked up. In fact, almost everyone looked up. Sure, the first years hadn't arrived with their prefects, but they didn't count, seeing as they didn't know **what** exactly the problem was.

"Okay, listen up. ALL OF YOU!" Lily shouted, regaining her composure. "Yes, James and I **are** going out, and yes, we did keep it a secret. But no, you can't annoy us, we are Head Boy and Girl and I have every right to take points off those who get in my way." She said sweetly, laughing inwardly at the look on a couple of second years' faces. Everyone in this room and gone their whole school life learning to run out of a room whenever Lily was in one of her famous moods, so plenty of people gulped.

"Next thing we'd like to address is Quidditch," James piped up. "This season has promised to be a good one. If you'd like to sign up, please see Professor McGonagall to put your name down, likewise for any wannabe commentators." Quite a few people perked up at James' comment and a few whispers broke out, but a stern glare from Lily shut them up.

"So everyone, be good, have a fun year and don't get into trouble," Lily concluded, giving James a good glare in the eye.

"Hang on," James said suddenly. Lily turned to look at him curiously. "Does this mean no more pranking?"

Lily smirked as an evil glint came to her eyes.

"Yes James, that's exactly what it means. Do you know what else it means?"

James looked at her quizzically.

"No more humiliating Severus," she said with glee.

"But, but…I…how can you do that to me?" he stuttered, oblivious to the rest of the Common Room talking again around them.

"Quite easily, I'm your girlfriend and you **will** listen to me. PLUS, it also means no more midnight wanderings around the castle!" James stared at her wide-eyed.

"How do know?" he finally managed to mumble.

"I didn't, I just guessed. Thankfully, you just verified it for me. Seeing as we're supposed to share a Dorm together, I can keep an eye on you. Speaking of which…" she promptly ran out of the Common Room. Ali and Gen were staring at him from where they were sitting. He glared back, with a look that said, _**'you**__ tell __**me**__ if this normal'_. They just shrugged in response. With no word, he sat down in the chair opposite the fire and fingered something in his pocket.

Making sure that no-one was watching too closely, he pulled out a blank piece of parchment, tapped it with his wand and murmured, "I solemnly swear that I am up to no good." He opened the map and looked for Lily. She was talking to Professor Dumbledore in the Headmaster's office. Not long later, they both stepped down the Gargoyle entrance. Their minute sized selves wondered down the hallways until they came to a stop outside the Head Dormitories. After two or three minutes of standing in one place, Dumbledore finally departed for his office and Lily made her way back to where James was now. But soon an unwanted figure was tailing nearly Lily, much too close for James' liking.

"Hey mate," Sirius said, but noticing James' expression, he grew worried, "Prongs, what's wrong?"

"Lily!" was the only answer that Sirius received before the map was dropped into his hands and James has sprinted out the door in pursuit of his girlfriend. Sirius took a look at the position Lily at the moment before it finally sunk in. Boy was he angry!

Instead of heading to the library like she normally would of once she'd discovered something, Lily had insisted set off towards the Headmaster's office. Once she had said the password 'Sugar quills' and knocked on his wooden door, he had graciously let her in, let her explain at once.

"Sorry to bother you at this time, sir, but we were just talking about our dorms and it occurred to me that I don't know where the Head dorms are," she said.

"Ah yes, would you like me to show you now?" he asked but already knowing the answer.

Professor Dumbledore led the way to the sixth floor, Lily, to far behind. Of the

"So Miss Evans, are you still wishing to transfer to Beauxbatons?" he asked with a twinkle in his eye.

'_I hate __that God-damned__twinkle!'_ Lily thought anxiously, but instead smiled and said, "Not at all"

"And I suppose your change of mind is due to your, ah, friendship with Mr. Potter?" he said knowingly.

Lily squirmed under his gaze; it was one thing to talk about a relationship with friends, but a whole other to have it come up in a conversation with a teacher, let alone the headmaster! Professor Dumbledore seemed to pick up on her sudden nervousness and he beamed at her.

"Well, here's where I must leave you Miss Evans." He said as they reached the empty hallway, "if you go straight through here," he gestured to a tapestry of an old man and woman sitting under a cherry tree. "You'll find you a dormitory. The password is 'sky high' I might suggest you find the Head boy and show him the way." Lily nodded in understanding. "I trust you can find your way back, I must return immediately."

"Sure, and thanks for showing me, sir." Lily said gratefully before turning on her heel and making the trip back to her common room.

Professor Dumbledore watched her retreating back before walking back to his office, "Time for another lemon drop, I think."

Lily had only just turned into the next corridor before she got the eerie feeling that she was being followed. She swung around, but saw no one.

Suddenly she heard a noise, in her haste to find the mysterious person she walked into a suit of armor and it fell to the floor with a clang.

"Well if it isn't Lily Evans," drawled a familiar voice. Lily instinctively backed away, but the person kept following her.

"What do you want?" she asked, taking deep breaths to calm herself.

"I want you to stay away from that Potter." He spat the name in disgust.

"Sev, I can expla–" Lily said, still backing up.

"You promised me! You said you wouldn't!" By now, Lily had backed up into the wall; Snape was closing in on her.

"I didn't– Sev, you shouldn't be out of your common room, it's–"

"Half an hour til' curfew!" he interrupted! By now he was inches away from a trembling body. "And by the time your hero Potter comes to save the day, you shall be mine!" he gave me the laugh that was soon interrupted by drawling voice.  
"Then even less time to fulfill that promise, SNIVELLUS cos 'Hero Potter' is here!" Lily gave a little squeak as Snape pressed his wand to her neck. "Do anything and she gets it."

James narrowed his eyes.

"This isn't about her, it's between us, leave her be."

"This army!" the voices of Sirius, Remus,Peter, Ali, Gen and Frank called together. Snape glanced at them before murmuring in Lily's ear. "One day I will get you and bring you to my master." Lily's eyes widened and she promptly fainted onto the ground. Snape let her fall before glaring at James and departing the scene.

James fell to his knees and bent over Lily. When she finally opened her eyes, she wrapped her arms around James and he lifted her bridal style. "Thanks," she murmured before closing her eyes and letting her head rest against his chest. The shock of finding out her once best friend had turned Death Eater and had attempted to bring her as hostage had worn her out.

As the group made their way back to the Common Room the others took a protective stance around Lily and James. Remus and Sirius stood at the front, leading the way, Frank and Peter kept watch behind them and Ali and Gen stood on either side of the couple. A silent agreement between them all swore that no more harm would come to Lily while she was with them.


	8. Vacation

**Disclaimer:** I solemnly swear that I don't own this stuff, the wonderful J.K. Rowling does.

**A Year To Remember**

**Chapter 8**

**~ Vacation ~**

Upon returning to the Head Dorms, the octet broke up to let Lily say the password. The portrait swung open to let them through, James was carrying the once again limp form of Lily. The group walked into the room and their mouths fell open, amazed at the view. To their left was a miniature version of their own Common Room. Evidentially, the house elves had spent the summer refurbishing it to Gryffindor colours. The previous Head Boy and Girl were a Ravenclaw and Slytherin respectively. Up the stairs to the left was Lily's room. James took these stairs, staggering under the weight of his girlfriend, and placed Lily gently on her bed. A quick glance around the room showed him that his should be the same. A four-poster, queen sized bed was situated in the centre, mahogany furniture lined the room. A bedside table next to the bed, a desk near the window opposite the door, wardrobe next to the bathroom door and a book case on the opposite side of the bed.

Another five minutes and Lily came to again. James finally let out a sigh of relief that he hadn't been aware he was holding. When she opened her eyes, James rushed forward and enveloped her in a massive hug. Lily clung on as if her life depended on it, her red hair handing limply around her face.

"James? What happened?" Lily croaked out.

"Lils don't talk. Snape…" James replied, anger at her 'attacker' evident on his face.

"Snape, he's a Death Eater. I must…tell…Dumbledore…"

"Lily…"

"Let me go, I have to go…" Lily struggled against him.

"NO! Lily. Wait for the morning. It's too late. You stay here and I'll patrol tonight."

"NO! I have to find Dumbledore!" She continued struggling, but James maintained his grip on her.

"Lily, I'm sorry about this, but _Stupefy_!" Lily slumped back on the bed. He rose from her arms and left the room. Placing a firm locking spell on the door, he ran down the stair and asked Frank, Gen and Ali to make sure no one came in or out of the tower. They readily agreed.

James gathered the Marauders, who promptly transformed to their animagus forms or hiding under the Invisibility Cloak (Remus) to follow along with James on his duties.

Lily woke up with a screaming headache. Sitting up, she groaned and looked around. The room around her was spinning in magnificent colours. It took another minute or two to begin to see clearly. Deep inside her, a feeling that something significant happened stirred and rose to the surface. She wouldn't be in the Head Girls rooms otherwise. With a start, she remembered Snape and the warning she had to give to Dumbledore. Rushing to the door, she yanked on the handle. It didn't open. She yanked again, it didn't even budge. Frustrated, she fell to her knees and sobbed. Another fruitless attempt followed another. She was so caught up in her mixed feelings and thoughts that she could barely pull a straight line of thought together.

It took a while to realise that she could use her wand to unlock the latch. Rolling her eyes at her stupidity, she reached inside her robes for the familiar stick of wood. It wasn't there. Frowning, she checked her entire person for the missing item of importance. It wasn't with her, or in her room. James had truly thought of everything.

On his way out, he had placed her wand underneath his pillow in his room. Unfortunately, he hadn't thought to lock the bathroom door. After many minutes of furious, yet affective thinking, Lily opened her side of the bathroom and found…another door. Stepping across the marble floor of the massive bathroom, she opened the dark door and looked around. It was an exact replica of her room, but had darker wood and James' stuff sitting around, yet to be unpacked. Seeing the open doorway, she strode across the room and into the hallway.

When she was barely three steps into the stairwell, Gen and Ali looked up. Lily all but groaned aloud. While it was good that her boyfriend cared enough to take her to her room, it was getting a tiny bit too much to lock her in her room and keep her friends on guard duty, who hadn't even known they were together until an hour or so ago. Lily again groaned at the awkwardness that must have ensued, while the two had known that their friends would be slightly annoyed at them, they hadn't thought that they would be living next door with all of their friends around (save on - Peter).

Frank, Gen and Ali heard her approach them and waited until the last possible moment to make themselves known. Lily kept walking down the stairs while they watched. Only about a million things were streaming through their heads at that very moment. _How did she get out? I thought he locked her in? _Too many thought were going through both their minds at the one time. Lily took her advantage to keep her steady walk down the staircase. Her head was still a little sore from earlier, so she slowed her pace down. But seeing her friends turn towards her, she completely forgot about her lack of wand and calmly walked towards the exit in the room below. Her eyes were focused on the handle, completely ignoring her friends. Gen and Ali watched her carefully, not knowing what she was doing. All they knew was that she wasn't allowed out of the room. Step by step, Lily descended the stairs and slowly she closed the distance between her and the door. Her friends weren't making any attempt to stop her so she took her chances and ran the rest of the way.

By the time they had gotten off their seats, Lily had long gone through the portrait of the man and woman under the cherry tree.

_James is going to kill us._ Was the last thing on her friends' minds as they continued chase through the halls of the sixth floor.

On the other side of Hogwarts, James and the Marauders were casually strolling the grounds on Head Boy duty. James was taking his position very seriously and was already planning his next big prank on the Slytherins, namely, one Severus Snape. Every time they had so much as turned Snape's hair purple, Lily had been on their case, hopefully this time she would see that he needed it badly, for hurting her. Tonight, the map was out, Remus was under the cloak holding it while a black, shaggy dog and a tiny rat followed him through the silent halls that soon became not so silent after Remus gave a shout of disbelief after seeing something on the map. His cry caused the other three to stop, he ripped the cloak off and showed James where his girlfriend was. James swore loudly and took off in the direction that Lily was heading, the headmaster's office. Hoping to Merlin that she met no one on the way, he sprinted away, friends at his tail. Remus stuffed the cloak and map away in his inner robe pocket along the way in case they saw any teachers and the two animagus transformed back to their human forms as they began the hunt for Lily.

Frank, Gen and Ali, were running twenty metres behind Lily, but yet they couldn't keep up. When Lily needed to do something, she did it and she did it fast. No one came in their path, thankfully, and by the time they had caught up with the Marauders, Lily had gone up the Gargoyle entrance. She'd managed to unknowingly time it so that it would close up behind her, blocking her friends' entrance.

The girls, Frank and the Marauders began the guessing game of the passwords for the Gargoyle, but quickly gave up, between gasping for air and guessing; they silently agreed to instead wait for her to come back down instead.

&&&

Lily and Dumbledore walked down the stairs in solitude. Both were going over what had inspired in their impromptu meeting.

"How did I guess you lot would all be here? Never mind. Hurry off to bed you" Dumbledore did a quick head count, "Seven. Well, in my day we never…" he muttered while walking back up the stairs. The seven seventh years just stared at him in silence.

"Always did think he was a bit of a nutter." Sirius murmured under his breath, unfortunately, everyone heard him.

"SIRIUS!" the girls yelled in unison while the boys just laughed, Sirius looked like a deer caught in the headlights, then he realised that Dumbledore didn't hear so started laughing with them.

For the rest of the walk back to the Head Dormitories, the octet laughed and joked around. Once Lily and James were inside the portrait hole, the remaining six shared a grin and walked to their own Common Room to hit the sack and prepare for tomorrow's classes.

&&&

Once inside, James pulled Lily close to him and said, "Don't you ever do that again! HONESTLY! Who runs outside just after being attacked with NO WAND!! You could have been hurt. Don't EVER do that again to me! I was so worried. Please Lily…" he clutched at her in his arms. Lily just stared up at him, only now comprehending that he was worried about HER. He hadn't locked her in her room for the sake of it earlier; it was for a reason, and her with her desperateness to see Dumbledore when her boyfriend clearly said they'd do it together TOMORROW, had disobeyed his wishes. She hung her head and became increasingly interested in her feet. James saw that she was only now understanding what he was on about and when he saw this gesture, he whispered "Please don't do it again, I was so worried Lils," and hugged her even tighter.

He only stopped when she gasped, "Can't breathe James."

"Sorry," he whispered, before pulling her in for a quick kiss. They released each other a little later, when they felt the need for air, and ran down to their separate beds for a good nights sleep.

&&&

The next morning, James gave Lily a detailed plan of what was going to happen until the Snape problem was over. He detailed everything. Lily listened as best she could, but decided it would be best to just work it out as she went along. First, they had to run to breakfast for their first day of classes.

Lily slowly got used to this arrangement. Once again, James' 'overprotective boyfriend' instincts caved in. Every morning, she was escorted to and from breakfast, to her every class (she was in all of James' classes), to and from lunch, dinner, the library, Owlery. Basically anywhere she went, James followed. This worked both ways as well. For every Quidditch practice, meeting and game, Lily was there. For the random onlooker, one would think she was taking her role as girlfriend a little too far, but really, she would just sit in the corner and read, study or do her homework.

One day, after a couple of weeks after the attack from Snape, Lily broke away from James' clutches, with the intent of visiting Hagrid. Only, she never made it. She distinctly remembered walking past the Herbology greenhouses, and then she saw SNAPE! After that, a flash of red light coming towards her, but after that her memory was blank up until now. She had awoken with a splitting headache (most likely from a couple of Stunners thrown at her) in a small room. The room barely scraped the top of her head when standing, had iron bars on one side, two plain walls and another with a small window up the top. Nothing was inside the cell, but her and her shackles that she hadn't noticed were on her before. It was only now that she realised that Snape must have brought her here, the evil Slytherin had brought right into the evil lair of his master, just as he'd promised!

A tall man with bright red eyes, who was barely human, walked in front of her cell, Lily immediately knew he was, not because she knew him, everyone knew him, but because he was the one person (thing) that the whole entire Wizarding World feared, He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, You-Know-Who or Lord Voldemort.

He opened his mouth to speak to her, more like hiss, and Lily cringed at his words. She prayed to Merlin that James, Dumbledore, or even Petunia would come save her from this hell-hole.


	9. Redemption

**Disclaimer:** I solemnly swear that I don't own this stuff, the wonderful J.K. Rowling does.

**A/N: **YAY!! It's my birthday today!! I thought I'd celebrate with giving you all a present, the next chapter! I'd also like to thank all my wonderful reviewers and to my fantastic readers who have come all this way with me, I'd probably have given this story up if I hadn't been amazed at the number of my hits that this story has so far accumulated. Anyway, on with the story. Although, if it's possible that I get soooo many alerts and people adding me to their favourites, how come I don't have that many reviews??

**A Year To Remember**

**Chapter 9**

**~ Redemption ~**

Voldemort sneered once more before saying to Lily, "Well if it isn't the filthy mudblood who finally woke up to play." Lily squeezed her eyes shut and clenched her hands into fists in her anger. She begged herself not top respond to the monster, _'He's not worth it, ignore him_,' she reminded herself in a fit of desperation.

"What do you want of me?" she finally spoke, noticing for the first time that her voice was cracked from screaming earlier.

"Don't sspeak unlesss you're sspoken to, Mudblood." Voldemort hissed. His red eyes flashed in anger and Lily shrank away in her cell. "You're here becaussse I need sssomething of you, and I will sssucceed whether you give it willingly notsss." The snake that resided on the evils man's shoulders gave a loud hiss and Voldemort gave her nose a small stroke before turning on his heel and slamming the dungeon once more into darkness.

Lily felt her way over to the small bench in her cell and sat down. She sighed. Hopefully James would hear her silent pleas for help and come and save her before something drastic happened to her.

JPLEJPLE

Back at Hogwarts, James was running all over the place looking for his girlfriend. One moment she was right behind him the next, she was gone! James figured that she'd disappeared to a nearby bathroom and had forgot to tell hi, but that didn't explain why she didn't turn up to any of her afternoon classes after lunch. It was now an hour after lunch and she still hadn't turned up. His searches had begun to turn fruitless, so he called on the help of their friends. Not one of them thought to check the map, nor to ask a teacher for help or to alert anyone that she was missing. The Marauders had barely missed the sneaky greasy git, so worried for Lily as they were. But every one around them did, the teachers had next to no fights to break up in the corridors between classes and were fast becoming very suspicious.

After the fifth day, James received an owl from Dumbledore, requesting him to his office. James too the seemingly never ending corridor to the gargoyle and spoke the password (Cockroach Clusters) all in a dream-like state. He walked in when Dumbledore asked and sat on the chair in from of the desk as if on autopilot.

His sleep-deprived body looked a mess. His face was gaunt and unkempt; his eyes had massive bags hanging from below them and his cheeks and begun to sink in. His hair was worse than ever and his well toned – Quidditch player's body was beginning to show his abrupt stop in his eating habits. James barely ate anything at meals, instead pushed the food around on the plate despite his friends encouraging him to eat. The teachers saw his current lack of any concentration he'd had in their class and he was unresponsive to class discussions or anything he normally would have done, he'd stopped. In his favourite subject, Transfiguration, he'd stopped contributing at all and it was this very teacher that decided to bring it up with her boss. Because of that very long discussion between the Headmaster and his Deputy, James was currently riding the staircase behind the gargoyle guarding Dumbledore's office.

He knocked and a calm voice called, "Come in," and James did so, walking over to sit on the chair in front of the desk before he was asked. Dumbledore took a d=good look at him and decided to offer the silent young man in front of him a lemon drop, goodness knows he looked as if he needed it. James eyed the small treat carefully, as if wondering whether it would bring Lily back. Finally he reached up to take the treat and popped it into his mouth wordlessly.

Dumbledore eyed the boy in front of him, no, young man. The kid in front of him was seventeen now, had been for the past six months. James had not said a word since he entered the older mans office, no joking, laughing or even the customary greeting he'd made for the professor on his first day here, nothing.

"Tell me dear boy, what is troubling you?" the anxious professor asked calmly, despite his crazy emotions at the moment of worry.

"Nothing," was the short reply. James hadn't yet looked up to meet his teacher's eyes yet, o Dumbledore knew almost instantly that something was the problem, and it was major.

Testing thin ice, Dumbledore said, "Mr Potter,' there was no response form the other wizard. Dumbledore was hocked, normally James would have retaliated from the use of his fully title, but he continued anyway, "Have you happened to have checked a mirror lately? You look like shit."

Perhaps it was the bluntness of his words, or maybe the swearing, no one knew, but James seemed to shock himself back into life, he nearly choked on the lemon drop in his mouth, causing Dumbledore to smile, not at the chocking but a job well done. He'd always prided himself at having the ability to shock or surprise even the most paranoid of people.

"Excuse my language sir, but that was bloody awesome! Just wait until I tell Sirius, imagine his face! He'd never believe me –" James babbled.

"Yes well, as exciting as telling you friends that you heard your Headmaster swear sounds, I must ask, what does seem the matter? I've had several complaints from various teachers that we're currently lacking our favourite pranksters … Although, what we'll do next year, I'll never know…" he trailed off staring intently at James, giving him the feeling that he was being x-rayed once again.

"Err, well, Lily … we can't find Lily." James muttered. Dumbledore's reaction was simply shock. For a man who knew simply well, everything, he seemed to not know this, this surprising the master of surprises.

"When did she go missing?" Dumbledore queried, suddenly looking older than James had ever seen him before.

"Monday," was the reply. It was now Saturday.

"Oh shit."

James just stared in disbelief.

"Have you tried a locating charm?" James just blinked at his mentor a few times and then threw his head on the table and banged it.

"So *bang* stupid how could I forget the simplest charm –" James continued until Professor Dumbledore held up a hand and James dunked his hand against it, thinking it was the table. He soon realised his mistake and looked up at the twinkling blue eyes, grinning cheekily, "Let's get to it then!"

Dumbledore was quite happy with the improvement in his student. In a space of less than half and hour, James had turned from a depressed young boy into his normal, cheerful self. Who knew that all it took was some good news and a couple of dropped swear words from his headmaster. He muttered a few Latin words and a bright white light shone from his wand, nearly blinding him and James. A whispered name on the end, "Lily Evans," conjured a map showing the two wizards Lily's location. For the third time that day, James heard his mentor swear in his presence.

"Oh bloody hell!"

"What? Where is she?" James questioned curiously, alarmed to hear the vulnerability in his teacher's voice.

"She's at Riddle Manor, in the dungeons of Voldemort's-"

"Lair, oh shit!" James finished for him. "Well, what are we waiting for then? Let's go and save her!"

Dumbledore stared bemusedly at him, "James, are you sure you want to come with me? I'm sure your parents would rather you stay behind –"

"I don't care what they'd want at the moment, are we going or not?"

"Fine, but before we go, have you got your Invisibility Cloak on you?"

"How did you kn-"

"Just do." Dumbledore said bluntly.

"Yes, I've got it."

"Good, you'll need it. Now promise me to do exactly as I say."

"Ok, can we go now?"

"Yep, I'll just write Professor McGonagall a quick note … good, let's go," after handing Fawkes the note, Dumbledore stood up and led James out of his office.

The journey to the front gates was a quiet one, the halls were empty, but for suits of armour clanking around and the small whispers of portraits who stared openly at the pair, not a word was spoken between them on the way out.

"I trust you can apparate now …" James nodded silently, "Good, off to Riddle Manor we go." With a turn and a loud 'crack', Dumbledore was gone. James sighed and mimicked his actions. He too disappeared from the streets of Hogsmeade.

Both men appeared on the outskirts of an old, abandoned cemetery. The older of the two looked to his partner asked the silent question once more.

"I'm sure, I need to rescue her." Dumbledore stared intently at James, giving latter the feeling of being x-rayed, before nodding and leading the way to a big, old, Victorian-style manor. For a man of his age, he moved rather quickly through the few remaining headstones. The sky was beginning to darken, the trees surrounding the mansion were quickly looking like scary monsters. James shivered involuntarily, and tried to keep up with his teacher's long strides.

At about twenty metres form the front door, Dumbledore stopped once more, causing James, who had been staring a the house instead of watching where he was walking, walked straight into his back.

"Sorry sir," James mumbled, moving away quickly.

"Yes, well, perhaps I should have given a bit more warning," Dumbledore staid cheerily, despite the situation they were in currently," I was going to say though, it may be a good time to put the Cloak on. Don't want you to be seen by any Death Eaters." He added, seeing James' confused look.

"Right, what about you, sir?" James asked, "Won't they see you?"

Dumbledore sighed, "Ah, James, I have many other ways to make myself invisible."

"Oh, ok then. Shall we continue on?"

"Yes good point. I'll distract Tom and his follower, you head on down to the dungeons." He said, leaving none of the plan open to discussion. "Good luck." Dumbledore placed a hand on James' shoulder in a reassuring manner, squeezed it and headed off to the stairwell, he turned back only once to see James swish on his Cloak, then he too disappeared from view.

&&&

(_Lily's POV a few days ago_)

A loud thud alerted Lily to the fact that someone was entering the dungeon. With only a small window in her cell, she was only just aware that it was a Wednesday, little's sleep and being tortured did that to you. She wondered where Dumbledore or James was, surely by now someone would have noticed her disappearance from the school grounds. "He better have used that bloody map by now or I will kill him when I get back, IF I ever get back," she whispered softly to no one, the only person close enough to hear her was a small spider who she lovingly named, Harry. It was Harry who got her through the many torture sessions that Voldemort insisted on putting her through, via his faithful servants who were stupid enough to join the idiotical maniac in the first place.

This noise that woke Lily up from her restless slumber, startled her in the darkness. Managing to calm herself, she stood in her cell and edged towards the locked door, but a sudden light turning on threw her off guard. Lily stumbled backwards. Evil laughter filled the already eerie dungeons. Lily shook herself back into getting up again. The door opened and before Lily had a chance to defend herself against her intruder, she was promptly thrown back against the wall with a flick of his wand. With a loud thud, she was back on the floor, from her position. She coughed and spluttered before gaining her breath back enough to look into his eyes with enough hatred in the glare to possibly work an AK on her attacker, even if she was a little winded.

"No need for the death glare Missy Mudblood," her flare intensified tenfold, "Ok, sorry," he didn't look a bit sorry, and her expression told him so, "Fine, don't believe me. I only came to bring you food Miss Mud-. Miss." He concluded, ducking his head in false shame.

Lily sneered at him, "Why bother apologising, we both know you don't mean it. And besides," he looked at her curiously, "There is no way in seven hells, am I eating this shit, what do you take me for, and idiot?" His expression told him that is exactly what he thought of her.

A couple of crucio's later, Lily lay shivering, famished and parched on the floor. As hungry as she was, she was determined not eat any of the food that was prepared in the same place that Lord Voldemort lived, breathed and slept in every day. Once again, she was holding onto that desperate piece of hop that she would be taken from this place.

&&&

"Did you hear that, Avery?" a lower ranked Death Eater asked after hearing a small thud.

"Hear what?" Avery replied.

Another thud echoed off the walls, followed by a whispered "Damn!"

"That." The other replied curtly.

"Yeah. Think we should investigate?" Avery asked nervously. It was, after all, his job to make sure that the 'filthy mudblood' couldn't escape from her cell. Not that she hadn't tried of course, she had. Nearly succeeded at her task as well. The only reason she still resided as the manor was because their Lord wanted her there. When asked why by a new recruit, a lowly nineteen year old boy, the son of one of his most faithful, most loyal Death Eaters, the poor kid was promptly sent a rather deadly Avada Kedavra as a present of thanks for asking the question. No one brought up the subject again. Though the father was angry at his Lord for murdering his son, he was angry with his son for questioning their Lord's actions; nonetheless, he released all his anger on poor, unsuspecting muggles during raids in random towns across the country.

Avery's friend nodded and stood up to have a sneak around to se who was there, but before either of them had a chance to move, a silent bright red light came zooming towards them, knocking them unconscious. The intruder, who was in fact Lily's to-be-saviour, crept forwards and into the dark dungeons. James ripped off his Cloak after deeming that no one else was present.

"James! You're here! I thought no one would ever save me! Thank you soooo much." Lily would have been jumping for joy had she not been immobilised on the floor of her cell.

"Lily, shhh. I need to actually get you out of here first. Oh. My. God. What did those evil . . . creatures DO to you?!?!?!" James nearly shouted, before lowering his voice quickly. He gestured to her much bruised body. Her petite figure was littered with black and blue bruises; her clothes had obviously been through a lot, but the thing that got James most, was that they were barely hanging off her body.

Lily looked at him uneasily. "James, I don't want to talk about it now," seeing the fiery look in his eyes, she added, "Please?"

James looked at her determinedly, but realising that she wasn't ready, he softened his features and bent over her, "Ok Lils, I'm gonna pick you up now, alright?" Lily nodded. As gently as he could, James picked her up easily and carried her up the stairs and out of the dungeons. What he'd forgotten though was that he'd left Dumbledore in search of Lily. What he didn't know was that leaving Voldy and Dumbledore together in the same room nearly always resulted in a fierce battle between the opposing Leaders of the Light and Dark. Walking in to find his Headmaster in battle with his former student as slightly disconcerting to say the least, but nevertheless, it was his entrance that stopped the many flashing balls of light that flew around the room. Both Dumbledore and the self-proclaimed 'Dark Lord' turned to look at their intruders. At that moment, James had no doubt, nor did the barely awake Lily in his arms that Dumbledore truly was the only man Voldemort was every afraid of, the fire in his eyes upon seeing James watch them duel was truly terrifying. Not only had James been seen by Voldemort, but he had also single-handedly destroyed the pre-arranged plan. He had, of course, not put his Cloak back on and had now shown Voldemort that he was the one responsible for freeing the evil man's prisoner.

"Oh shit." James said. Dumbledore was on him in a flash, clasping his old, pale but horrifically strong hands on James' arms in a vice-like grip and apparating them from the hall of Riddle Manor,

The landed back in Hogsmeade where Dumbledore didn't lead them back to Hogwarts, nor did him let go of James, but to the _Three Broomsticks,_ where he swiftly asked Madam Rosemerta if he could 'borrow her floo.' She looked a little puzzled, but agreed anyway. Dumbledore dragged James and Lily to the floo, chucked in a handful of floo powder, which he'd grabbed from a pot on the mantle, and yelled "Hogwarts Infirmary."

Dumbledore, James and Lily spun away from the pub and into the Hospital Wing, leaving a very, very confused Madam Rosmerta behind.

7

2,994 Words


	10. Enlightenment

**Disclaimer: None of this is mine. If I did, i would be immensely rich... but I'm not so I guess I don't own it.**

**A Year To Remember**

**Chapter 10**

**~ Enlightenment ~**

Lily's recovery was a speedy one. It seemed her stay under the young new matron, Madam Pomfrey, was destined to be a short one. With good reason too – Madam Pomfrey was fresh from Healer School and not many of the older students fully trusted her yet, because only a few years ago, she was at the school with them as a student. Although, only those old enough to remember her from their first few years at the school recognised her talents as a Healer. As a child, she'd had the natural gift of healing and then as a teen the passion for practising her talents on the injured in her Common Room, These were the few that had any real trust in the new nurse at Hogwarts School.

Upon seeing that Lily was safe, James, unfortunately didn't return to his true self. From worrying as to whether Lily was safe, dead or alive, had turned to whether she would make it. His friends were anxiously worried for his health; James had stopped making the trip to the Great Hall altogether, instead making up random excuses. The staff at this Wizarding School in Northern Scotland were steadily waiting for Lily to get better, hoping she'd be able to stop this crazy notion of his that seemed to want to kill him before their very eyes.

The Marauders, bar James, and the girls and the honorary member of the group, Frank, were terribly worried for James and Lily. James, because of his reaction to the news of Lily and Lily, because of how much the poor girl had to go through in the past few days.

Once Lily was released from the Hospital Wing, Dumbledore called herself and James to his office about Lily's brief visit to Riddle Manor.

"I must confess," Dumbledore said once they were seated, "That these were not the circumstances on which I had planned to congratulate you on receiving her Head-boy and girl-ship. Though, I myself had a lot of say…"

James and Lily looked at each other, and without attempting any discretion what-so-ever, rolled their eyes in earnest. Dumbledore noticed this almost immediately, with his twinkling blue eyes as sharp as ever behind their half-moon glasses. He too realised that they meant it in jest. Yet they didn't say anything – not that they needed too.

"I suppose you were expecting this to be about you recent vacation, Miss Evens."

"I would hardly call that…that…place a VACATION! Oh yes, did I mention that being beaten by bloody Death Eaters is like a relaxing day at the beach?! NO HEADMASTER, I think that doesn't QUITE fall under the category of vacation! More like TORTURE!! Lily was slightly breathless after her rant and slumped back against her chair. James stared angrily at his headmaster in defence of what she said. Unconsciously he edged his chair closer to hers and laid his hand on her arm.

Upon seeing this, Dumbledore's eyes twinkled so furiously, James and Lily were sure they'd fall out soon, yet they said nothing about it. Dumbledore remained oblivious to the shared thoughts and started speaking, "I'm sorry if you misunderstood me, Miss Evens, but we must continue. Would you mind giving me a few details about …"

Lily was interrogated by her headmaster for the next hour or so. As Chief of the Wizengamot, Albus Dumbledore had every right to do the interrogation of a victim with or without the use of Veritaserum, only one of the Wizarding Worlds most powerful truth serums. Yet he decided against the use of it in this situation. He could tell that she was telling the truth through her body language. No one, unless they were a trained actor, could fake their emotions as well as the real thing, and Lily was in a full blown sobbing fit, leaning into the comforting chest of while being cuddled by his long, strong arms. She had migrated from her chair to James' and then onto his lap. Once they were finally done talking, Dumbledore stopped asking questions, thanked her profusely and abruptly change the subject, which all parties present were thankful for.

"Now onto a more…. happy matter, we have two new students!"

James stared at him blankly while Lily asked, "Sorry, but this concerns us … how exactly?"

"Oh, yes, silly me. I forgot. Well, you two as Head Boy and Girl are expected to help out the new students around the school," Dumbledore explained.

"But sir wasn't the sorting ceremony last month?" James butted in.

"Yes, it was. As I was saying, these are transfer students, sisters, from the school Beauxbatons," he stared intently at Lily as he said this, as if he were x-raying her soul. Lily squirmed uncomfortably under his gaze. "And the eldest will be in your class with you two. Her name is Nicole de Lancret." James shot up, astounded. In his sudden movement, Lily would have flown off the chair had he not of grabbed her around the waist tightly and put her back to the chair before pacing the room and, thinking out loud.

"Do you mean to tell me that she is coming here!? I can't believe this! Don't you know who she is! I can't believe it at all! Her sister's alright, year but she's just plain ARRRGH!! I need to go think!" With that, James marched out of the room with his girlfriend and headmaster staring blankly after him.

"Okey-dokey, that was normal," Dumbledore said vaguely, still staring open-eyed at the still open door. Lily giggled a little before saying:

"Yeah, it was. So, where were we?"

"Oh yes, Nicole, well I was planning on asking the two of you to show her around, you know, be her friend and such 'till she settled down. I'll get some prefects to show her younger sister around once she's here."

Lily felt immediately relieved now that she knew what the contents of the meeting, finally. "Sure, that's fine, I'll tell James. Actually, about his reaction to her name, do you have any idea…?"

"Why he did so?"

"Yes."

"I believe it may be something to do with her parents, but other than that, she says she's changed, and I believe her. Otherwise, I don't know." Dumbledore said cheerily, popping another lemon drop in his mouth. "If there isn't anything else…"

"Actually there is." Dumbledore nodded, so Lily continued.

"About Nicole's sister, what's her name?"

"Ah, her name is Jacqueline."

"Oh thanks. I better go now." With that, Lily nearly sprinted from the room, intent on finding James.

&&&

"James! There you are!" Lily had been running for ages and had travelled nearly the entirety of Hogwarts Grounds twice over in her search. Now that she'd found him however, she gave a very un-ladylike collapse on the insides of an empty classroom she'd eventually found him in.

James jumped to his feet from onto of the teacher's desk and ran to her side; he graciously helped her up before reprimanding her.

"You know you're not supposed to be doing anything overexerting for another week or so, don't you?" Lily nodded and he continued, "And you know that Madam Pomfrey will surely kill you in a manner of speaking when she finds out you ran all over the school, don't you?" Lily nodded once more. "Good, so that means that you know that I'm gonna take you to her right now to tell her immediately?" Again, Lily nodded but stopped when she realised what he'd said.

"HEY!! You can't do that!!" she fumed, while James was in full blown laughter.

"The look … on your face … hilarious … priceless …" James chuckled, gasping for air. Lily slapped his arm annoyed and turned away, intent on annoying him as much as possible for his cheek.


	11. Disobliging the School

**Hey everyone! Another chapter for you all to devour! This one was written last week, completed at four in the morning mind you! But it took me AGES to find the time to actually type it up. Anyway, I finally got there, and eventually got it to my unofficial Beta, (Em!! You rule!) who just sent it to me this morning. Just a little shout out to all you lazy bums out there, there is a little thing called 'REVIEWING,' you may wish to learn how to do it if you don't already. **

**Anyway, enjoy!**

**A Year To Remember**

**Chapter 11**

**~ Disobliging The School ~**

For the next few days, Lily was vigorously interrogated by various peers in the Gryffindor Common Room. Most wished to learn what the evil He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named looked like, others demanded to know how she managed to escape his clutches and whether it was true that their Headmaster had taken part in her initial escape. When approached by these people, she simply turned her back and walked in the opposite direction, or if it was unavoidable, she tuned them out by humming her favourite Muggle tune or beginning a conversation with any of her friends that was nearest her, mostly James.

However, the number of students harassing her for information increased dramatically as the news leaked out. The Hogwarts Rumour Mill had begun. It took barely half a day for the Slytherins and suspected and known children of Death Eaters to begin hounding her. They stalked her and her friends in groups, only to gloat in her face how much the 'Dark Lord' was a good man that he let the 'poor ickle Mudblood' go from his premises. Lily couldn't stop her reaction to this as she gritted her teeth and clenched her fists.

Finally the staff took pity on herm and the following day, four days after she'd escaped, Dumbledore stood up after dinner concluded and announced that Lily was to be left alone. Lily cheered silently in her seat but inwardly was rather annoyed that he hadn't done anything about it earlier. But what really topped it off for Lily and her friends was the surprise announcement that there was a Hogsmeade weekend visit the following day, a Saturday. Anyone in years three and above with a pre-signed permission slip were free to spend the day at the village. Never before had a trip been organised so early in the school year, and without the Head Girl and Boy organising it at that. But, nevertheless, they were all very pleased at the news and had no problem announcing it to the school. Although the normal student was clapping happily, the Marauders, and believe it or not, Lily, Ali and Gen, stood up on the bench they were once sitting on and gave a happy jig. Never mind that the Head Boy and Girl were doing it, but Dumbledore didn't say a word in protest, but merely raised his glass to toast their obvious merriness, and sat down.

Meanwhile, the rest of the students and faculty were staring at the senile old man, dumbfounded. Here he was, Headmaster of a prestigious wizarding school in Scotland for girls and boys – blandly ignoring their outrageous behaviour.

Down at the Slytherin table, Severus Snape was gripping his goblet of pumpkin juice furiously. His onyx-black, beady eyes were flashing in anger, while his knuckles turned white in rage. There was their Headmaster, allowing his 'precious Gryffindors' to do whatever they liked – without punishment. Of course, had he been the once to stand up and dance on his seat, not only would he be in loads of trouble and have mounts of points lost – he'd also be the laughing stock of the school. In his musings, he gripped his goblet far too tight, and glass sprayed everywhere. The juice it was containing flew down and landed on the crotch of his pants, giving the impression he'd had an accident with his bladder.

Gritting his teeth, Snape covered it with a napkin and soon forgot about it. Only as they were leaving the Great Hall did he finally remember about it. Of course it had to be Potter and his gang who saw it first.

"Hey look everyone, Snivellus wet himself in all the excitement." The students nearby had begun to turn and stop and stare at him.

"Leave me alone Potter," Snape muttered, his eyes burning up at the unfairness of it all.

"Aww, is little Snivelly gonna go cry to his mummy?" James sneered at him. Snape turned to look at the Headmaster for help, but surprise, surprise. The old fool had ignored the scene that was gathering in the Great Hall, once again turning a blind eye against his precious lions.

Another glance at Lily told him a lot too. Ever since he'd lost her the day he 'accidentally' called her a Mudblood, she'd ignored him. 'She would pay', he thought bitterly. James, however, noticed the glare directed at his girlfriend and stepped out in front of her, protecting her from him.

"Come on guys, let's go," James mumbled to his friends and together they exited the Hall, making their way up the marble staircase to the Heads Common Room, where the septet were ushered into the portrait hole behind the old man and woman next to the cherry tree.

Once inside, Lily turned to the Hogwarts pranksters-in-residence.

"So, what do you lot have planned for him?" she asked slyly.

"Well you see, first we plan…" James began before stopping all of a sudden. "Hang on a second. Why do YOU want to know? Not going to rat us out are you?"

Lily giggles, everyone in the room stared at her. Not once had they ever heard her giggle before, not even her best friends, or Stacy for that matter.

"No silly-billies. I just know you sooooo well that I know that you lot are bound to prank Severus sooner or later. So what's it gonna be this time? Hmm. A new hairstyle? An in-front-of-the-whole-school humiliation, hanging upside down with an easy 'Levicorpus'? Come on! I'm dying to know!"

The whole time she talked, no one moved a muscle. To be honest, they were rather scared of this new, uncovered side of Lily Evans. It was actually Wormtail who broke out of his stupor first.

"Well I like the sound of a whole school prank – you know, prank everyone in the school," he said sheepishly, mumbling a little towards the end.

James sighed in annoyance. While he did like the little guy, he could truly get on his nerves a little with his stupidness sometimes. "Wormy, she didn't say 'whole school prank,' she said 'in-front-of-the-"

'NO WAIT!!" interrupted Sirius, "He has a point." All heads turned towards him curiously, "We could prank the whole school, we'd just need a little help from the house-elves, that's all."

"SIRIUS BLACK!!" Lily screeched suddenly.

Sirius flinched as if he were stung by a particularly vicious bee. "Yes Ma'am, Sirius Black at your service."

Lily ignored his cheekiness – for now- and continued. "Are you telling me that you know where the house-elves are in this building, school, thing?"

"Yes ma'am."

"And you haven't told me this before, why exactly?" she screeched.

"I…I… I don't know ma'am."

"James, sweetie?" she asked in a sugary voice, a complete opposite to the tone she'd used on Padfoot.

James, on the other hand didn't know whether to laugh or cry. To his right, Lily's friends – Ali and Gen were doing the former. The two girls were laughing their heads off at Sirius' obvious discomfit. But to his left, Sirius was very close to doing the latter, Sirius would later say, "Girls are down right scary when they're like that; Must be that time of the month again. Just like a pipe bomb or something." But rather than show his emotions at the moment, James looked back at his girlfriend and said, "Yes dear?" preparing for the worst.

But it never came.

"Could you take me to the kitchens to see the house-elves?" she asked. Of all the questions he was prepared on answering, this definitely wasn't one of them.

"Hey look," Remus said after a couple of minutes of James' silence. "James is finally knocked speechless. And by his own girlfriend at that! This day should go down in history!" Sirius and Gen cheered happily.

"Shut up guys!" James finally said, Lily giggled. "Sure Lily, I'll take you. As long as these," he pointed to their friends, "idiots don't come."

"That's fine by me." With that, she reached up and gave him a gentle kiss to which he responded eagerly turning it into the beginnings of a heated snogging session. Thankfully, Sirius had enough practice at that kind of thing to be able to now recognise when things were getting a little out of hand and so pulled them apart.

'WHOA guys, break it up!" he told them when they turned around suddenly.

"MY EYES!" all heads turned once more like a pendulum to looks at Ali. She had her hands covering her round brown eyes, "They're burning! Somebody help me!" Lily and James laughed.

"Shush it Al, how many times do you reckon I've walked in on you and Frank in the Broom closets whilst on Prefect Duty this past year?!" This shut her up even more so, but only fuelled the laughter.

Finally Remus brought the conversation back to the planned 'whole school prank.' "Siri, are you sure that a whole school prank will work, remember what happened last time?"

Sirius shook his head, "No," he said firmly, "We were young and stupid when that happened, it'll work this time, I promise you."

"Okay, I trust you," James said. "But," he turned to the girls, "we can't let these three know our secrets."

"But James, I wanna know what you're gonna do!" Lily whined almost childishly to her boyfriend. But he took no note in it.

"Lily, no, it's gonna be a surprise for you lot as well, can't have the Head Girl getting in trouble now, can we?" Lily shook her head slowly. It was true, her whole life she'd grown up with important morals, and she kept to them firmly. One of these was to not get into trouble – or detention for that matter. She turned to her friends, "Let's go girls." And the three of them walked up the stairs to Lily's Head Girl Room, where they'd spend the night.

–

The following night at dinner, the three girls were waiting anxiously for the food to appear. Tonight was the night that the prank would commence. Lily sat jittering in her seat. Never before had she been so excited for a prank to begin. Normally it was so she could chastise it, not enjoys it. Bit unknowingly, tonight was also going to be the night that the two de Lancret girls would be sorted into the subsequent house, and that it just what the Headmaster stood to announce.

"Before we begin our dinner that has been prepared so wonderfully for you all after your hard day at Hogsmeade Village for the older ones and the excellent game of quidditch played by the younger years, I have an announcement. The first is that, to whoever stole my stash of lemon drops, could you please do the right thing and come and see me after we conclude dinner." He stared down at the Gryffindor table. Suddenly Sirius stood up.

"Sorry Professor, I just got a bit hungry," he said cheekily.

Dumbledore chuckled at his confession, "Quite alright my boy; I for one know just how yummy they can be. Anyway, back to topic. My second announcement is the arrival of two girls from Beauxbatons." Nearly the entirety of the male population of the school perked up at those words. Lily nearly laughed at their stupidity. If only they knew… "I announce … Mademoiselle Nicole de Lancret." As if to prove some unknown point or maybe she just liked big entrances … Nicole pushed forward the big oak doors and entered the Great Hall like a lioness would stalk their prey.

Professor McGonagall ceremoniously pulled out the sorting hat and a larger stool than the one usually used and place the hat on her blonde hair once she sat down. And so the began the agonising wait. On ever table in the room, each student (the guys in particular) was hoping they'd get the beautiful new student. Even as she sat there, her long blonder hair tossed carelessly over a shoulder, her green eyes closed in concentration, she looked stunning.

Some five minutes later, the hat shifted on her head, as if it were nearly dreading the moment it made its decision.

"GRYFFINDOR!" the humble sorting hat yelled to the waiting students of the hall, like a mother bird giving a worm to her anxious and hungry babies – it was that intense of a wait.

The students seated at the Gryffindor table immediately stood up and didn't just applaud politely, they went simply CRAZY. The excitement of gaining a new student midway through the school term was, because of its rarity, overwhelming.

Up at the Head table, the teachers were politely clapping, watching as the blonde girl carelessly swung her hair over her shoulder and gracefully steeped down to the Gryffindor table, where she sat a few seats away from James. Lily eyed the girl as a rush of protectiveness flooded through her. She caught Nicole's eye and place a hand on his arm as if to say, 'Stay away, he's mine." Nicole turned away and met the people surround her before Dumbledore's voice penetrated the chatter. They all fell silent in anticipation.

"Finally, we welcome Mademoiselle Jacqueline de Lancret." The doors once more swung open and revealed Nicole's younger sister. From a far off glance, once wouldn't guess that the two girls were even distantly related for Jacqueline looked nothing like her older sister. She was shorter, at least fifteen years old, had long, flowing chestnut coloured hair and wide, innocent brown eyes. Jacqueline had a sweet tempered flair around her that screamed kindness. But like her sister, she had the ability to catch anyone and everyone's attention.

Once she was finally seated on the stool, sorting hat on her head, the hall fell silent. Minutes later, the hat gave way to the waiting hall.

"Hufflepuff!"

This time, the other end of the hall erupted into noise. The sheer magnitude of the eruption was enough to blow off someone's eardrums. Jacqueline, however, took no haste in removing the sorting hat and returned it with a smile and a whispered, "Merci," she turned and walked to the Hufflepuff table, leaving a shocked Head of Gryffindor and Deputy Headmistress limply holding the sorting hat. Professor McGonagall quickly gathered her senses and whispered "Your welcome," at the retreating girl's back.

Finally, Professor Dumbledore stood up and once more declared dinner to be served. But Lily suddenly realised that if dinner was to be served that would mean that … she turned to look at James, eyes wide open. "The prank!" she whispered, his face paled dramatically in light of her news.

But before they could do anything, the food had appeared on the table. All their hard planning be damned, this was going to be messy!

And so, an hour later, Lily and the Marauders found themselves seated in front of their Head of House, heads bowed and everyone of the five deeply shameful.

"I hope you five are ashamed of yourselves – making a fool out of the school in front of our new students. You ought to be lucky that no one got hurt, pulling a stunt like that. As for you Miss Evans," Lily looked down, "I would never have believed it of you. Detention." Lily looked up at her, shocked. "Tonight, no don't you dare look at me like that young lady, you clearly deserve it. My office in one hour. You may go." Lily sprang to her feet and nearly leapt out of the office to her waiting friends who looked at her expectantly.

"Detention. In one hour." She informed them sadly. Both Ali and Gen gave her a hug, letting her know how sorry they were that she got dragged into the boys' mess.

Back in Ol' McGonagall's office, she was giving them a stern talking to.

"Boys, while I really appreciate you trying to cheer Lily up."

"She didn't do it." James interrupted suddenly.

Professor McGonagall turned to look at him. "Didn't do what?"

"Lily didn't do any of the prank," he explained, "See it was a surprise, we kicked her and the girls out of the room while we planning it, so she didn't do it.

McGonagall looked rather relieved, "Oh, I knew that."

"B-bu-but why's she in trouble then?"

"She's not in trouble."

"But she didn't do it – WHAT?"

She laughed at his expression. "Lily's not in trouble, I just need to speak with her rather urgently. But anyway, thank you boys for going out of your way to cheer Lily up, even if it sort of – failed. I'll award you twenty points to Gryffindor, each."

Sirius was the first to stop staring (they were all so shocked.)

"Thanks Aunt Minnie," he said cheekily.

"Watch it Mister, or I'll take those points back."

Sirius did the smart thing and didn't answer; instead he dragged his shocked friends out the door.

–

"I can't believe I have detention! How could she? I'm Head _Girl_ from crying out loud!" Lily ranted to her boyfriend once he'd made his way back to the Head Common Room.

"Lily please stop, I'm _very_ sure you'll enjoy this, so you better go. You've got ten minutes before you have to be there."

"Okay James, will you be here or in Gryffindor tower?"

"Err, Gryffindor tower. Now GO!!" James kissed her before ushering her off.

"Love you." She said before she could stop her self.

"I love you, too, now go!" he replied, watching her hurry out of their shared tower and down the sixth corridor.


	12. Eheu!

**Disclaimer: **I solemnly swear that I am a complete and utter idiot for not updating in five months, nearly six. And, I also swear that I don't own this, JK Rowling does... and she gets money for it - I don't.

**A Year To Remember**

**Chapter 12**

**~Eheu!~**

It was with dread in her step that Lily grudgingly walked to her head of house's office. Never before in her six-and-a-bit years of learning at Hogwarts (nor in her few years at Muggle primary school) had she _ever_ had a detention. Truth be told, she wasn't sure what to expect. James said that she would enjoy this, but _how?_ Sure, he had had his fare share of detentions, actually above his fare share (although she had to admit, he _did_ earn them). So that would mean that he knew what he was talking about, right?

She passed the sneering faces of the Slytherins without so much of a glance, a couple of younger first years stepped out to ask a question but saw the concentrated look on her face and quickly ran to the nearby sixth year prefect of their house. Lily Evans, normally the most curious and knowledgeable student to walk the halls of Hogwarts of her time, had no clue as to what was happening around her; a fight could have broken out under her very nose and she would have walked straight passed it after giving it a once over and a nod. The students of that particular corridor were awfully frightened of her and so let this strange impersonator of their Head Girl pass without so much as a wink.

Lily leant up to the painted portrait and whispered, 'Carpe Diem.' The Griffon looked wearily at her then swung forward on its hinges and allowed her access.

'Good luck,' the disembodied voice gasped hoarsely. Lily nodded curtly, a gesture learnt long ago from her old _friend_ Severus, and entered the threshold.

Her Professor was no where to be seen. 'Hello? Professor, are you here?' She walked into the room with desk, 'Hello?' She heard rustling behind her and turned around quickly.

'Sorry, dear. Didn't mean to frighten you,' Professor McGonagall exclaimed upon seeing Lily jump back in fright, clutching her over-working beating heart.

'No, it's alright Professor, I'm ok. I think,' Lily took a deep breath and calmed her heart urgently. 'I'm here for my detention,' she reminded the older woman.

'Yes. About that, you see I need to talk to you.'

'Huh?'

To Lily's absolute astonishment, the teacher before her laughed. 'Yes talk to you. It's about James.'

'Oh. You've noticed it, too, then?'

'It's not that hard to notice, my dear. James has, for the past few years, been the life and soul of these grounds. He and his, dare I say it, out_rage_ously hilarious friends and their pranks have made these years the fun that they have been. Not to mention his talent on the quidditch pitch. He needs you, my dear.'

'Me? I'm sorry; did you just say what I think you did?' Lily asked, trying to stop her mouth from dropping. She was very sure she saw a fly nearby and was one hundred percent sure she didn't feel like acting like a frog, nor was she particularly hungry for flies. Maybe next time though…

'Yes, I did. James needs you. I'm sure you've noticed. His health has been in danger since that… night. Since then he stopped everything to find you, including eating. He… according to Madam Pomfrey… only has mere months, maybe a year at most,' she said gravely, placing her hand upon Lily's.

'No. He can't die. No. I won't let him,' Lily said distraughtly, snatching back her hand and cradling it to her chest, 'he can't die, I … I l-love him.'

'Then I suggest you look after him,' she said with a pointed look. 'Go, he needs you.'

Without any further encouragement from her favourite teacher, Lily sprinted out the door and ran to the Gryffindor Common Room. She shot up the many staircases, cursing to herself about the number of them. By the time she reached the Fat Lady, her legs were aching. But then again, so was her heart. She knew something was different by the time that she gasped for air and managed to breathe out the password. By the sad look on the old portrait's face, she knew something was not right.

'JAMES!! What the _hell_ do you think you're doing? Get away from her!' Lily yelled, having regained her senses from the sight before her. James, her beloved boyfriend, was tied up on the couch with the new girl. Nicole what-ever-her-name-is was snogging him senseless. Lily, seeing that James was trying to detach himself, threw her hands in the air and ran out the room, tears threatening to fall.

It was within the safety of the confining walls in her bedroom that she let them spill down the cheeks. How could she have been so _foolish_? He was James Potter; of course he would give up on her, a mudblood, (she had no qualms calling herself this now, she had accepted it long ago) for someone of a higher blood status. Nicole was, without a doubt, a pureblood, who, in Lily's eyes, worked very quickly. Nicole_ knew_ that they were together; she saw it herself at dinner that very day. She saw Lily and James laughing together, eating together, and simply _being_ together in the Great Hall.

Nicole, in a single action, had ruined a relationship that had been in the making for six years, and in a single second broke a bond so strong that the gods couldn't break. For not the first time, Fate stuck her abnormally large nose into other people's business and destroyed everything! Lily herself was not above ranting, nor throwing things at the door when it unexpectedly opened.

Alice and Imogene stood at the door, waiting to enter when suddenly Lily threw herself at them, sobbing her little heart out. Neither of her two friends said anything against her actions, they had seen the whole thing. Of course, they hadn't seen that tiny part where James said _no_. But, in their eyes, it was a complete betrayal of their best friend.

The three friends had finally made it to the bed; Lily snuggled in between the two of them, finally at peace. It wasn't often they did this, only when the occasion called for it. This was one of those times.

It was when she had finally drifted off to sleep that they heard a knock on the door. Ali managed to dislodge herself from the others and stood to answer it, holding the door open enough to stick her head out.

'What do you want, Potter?'

'I need to see Lily, I need to apologise. Please?' James was beginning to look desperate, his whispered attempts to keep Lily asleep began to fail, 'It isn't my fault, you must have seen her, she came onto me! Not the other way around! Please? I have to explain.'

Ali looked at Gen who shook her head reverently, 'No, I'm sorry, Potter, just go. It's the least you can do, particularly after your display in the Common Room.'

James looked at them desperately, anxiously wanting them to empathise, to under_stand_ why he was apologising. But they saw none of it, and forced him away. He walked with his tail between his legs, so to speak, and angrily yelled at himself for ever getting himself in that situation.

Sirius met him in the Heads Common Room downstairs and looked at him wanting to see the light of happiness in James' eyes, but there was none. He sighed, and held his arms out to his broken friend. James, like Lily could only be so strong. It was like the whole kidnapping all over again, James again threw himself into his studies and once again, his health went down the drain. Lily was no better. She knew that James was getting thinner and thinner everyday yet she refused to see him, preferring to wallow in her self-pity. She knew that it was up to her whether James lived or not but at the moment, she didn't really care. For all she cared, he could die. James could see that she herself died a little each day. No, not the same as his dying, not health wise but emotionally. She was dying a little more in her personality, her school work was failing, she was ever so close to breaking down, and there was nothing he could do until _she_ let him in.

'You see, this is the _very_ reason I didn't want to fall for him,' Lily ranted. Ali and Gen looked at each other and sighed; it was the same every time. Lily would wallow about then once she had the energy to get out of bed, she would over-do it and yell at an invisible force like it was James. This time, it was about him rather than to him.

'Lily, please calm down…'

'CALM DOWN! I can't calm down; it's all James' fault! Has he even come to apologise? No. I bet he hasn't. That low-life git!'

'Well…'

'He hasn't come has he,' she looked forlornly at her friends. Both Ali and Gen looked at each other, the split second allowing them to exchange a non-verbal conversation.

'No, he hasn't.'

Why did they lie? The two would ask themselves later that night. It was for one simple reason. They didn't want Lily getting hurt again.

Back in the Griffindor common room, Nicole was sitting smugly, surrounded by a bunch of gossiping girls. By the corner Remus was placing anxiously. Peter was watching him walk back and forth, back and forth.

'Mooney, just please go and check on them, you're going to wear out the carpet soon. Besides, I'm getting dizzy.'

Remus glared at him, 'Who said you had to watch me?' Whoever did indeed…? Remus spun on his heel and exited the warmth of the common room. His appearance in the Head's dormitories was of no consequence; Lily was asleep in her room with Ali and Gen by her side, James downstairs by the fire with a huge black dog cuddled closely to him in his arms. Remus sighed, his anger dissolving at the sight of his broken friend. He conjured a thick blanket and draped it over the pair before checking on Lily. In this matter, 'though both couldn't see it, it was nobodies fault except Nicole's. In time, Remus hoped, Lily and James would see that they were foolish to let a small incident get between them, between a love so true only the stars could break fully.

_A/N: I'm baaaaaacck! So sorry for not updating for five months. I'm afraid the only excuse that I have is that Life got in the way. That and I decided that I would hate this story for a few months. During that I had a sever writer's block so I started my other fic, _Fine Thread if Hope_, so now I've decided that while that has regular semiweekly updates, this one can continue its monthly ones._

_Hope you enjoyed it,_

_lat134_

_Ps. can any of you guess the title meaning?_


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